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WANDERINGS IN EUROPE 



W. T. MELOY, D. D. 



Pastor of the First United Presbyterian Church, of 

Chicago, Illinois, and Author of "Lucile Vernon ; 

or, The Church at Lansington." 



ILLUSTRATIONS. 



R 15 I 

CHICAGO: *f / 



La Monte, O'Donnell & Co, 

1892. 



*»« library 

Of CONGRESS 
WASHINGTON 



Copyright 1892, by W. T. Meloy. 



Y 



^ 



PEE FACE. 

Many members of society would be embarrassed if 
asked what right they have to live. How pleasant it 
would be to hear them say, " We can not tell you, but 
we have a few friends who would be sorry if we did 
not live!" 

If anyone rashly demands why this book is pub- 
lished, the author refuses to criminate himself further 
than to say, that he has a few friends who are willing 
to read it. It will not be received by those who go 
abroad and see nothing, nor by those who stay at 
home and read nothing. Like most of his fellows, he 
is willing that his work shall be criticised. He has 
been subjected to the surgeon's knife when he was 
unconscious, but before he slept he knew that he was 
in the hands of his friends. He desires to acknowledge 
the kindness of The Illustrated World? s Fair^ through 
its editor, Mr. John McGovern. 

He now commits this book to those from whom 
he has received the high honors of friendship and 
confidence, in the hope that they may be willing to 
sympathize with him in the joys and perplexities of 
wandering in Europe. 

W. T. M. 

Chicago, December 3, 1892. 



^0 

(?hat[le$ filbert Bavia, $. B,, 

$ (Constant Jfqiend, $ki)led physician, and 
genial Companion 

^hi$ Booh Is dedicated. 



CONTENTS. 

Chapter I. — Good-by — Close Quarters— Mars— Deck- Walkers 
Whales or Porpoises ? — Old Enemies but New Friends — 
Icebergs. 

Chapter II. —Wrecks — Brave Ladies — "Naw" — Stupid Rail- 
roading. 

Chapter III. — Tragedy — William and Anne— Warwick — Ken- 
ilworth— The Earl's Furniture. 

Chapter IV.— Mai de Mer— Money Talks— Under the Oaks- 
Rescued — The Artist's Walk — Barneveldt. 

Chapter V. — " Met Rooken " — A Tea-Party — Cologne — Tips 
—The Rhine — Roland and Hildegunde. 

Chapter VI. — Mayence — Dueling — Handsome Ladies — An 
Old Artist. 

Chapter VII.— Venice — Barber Poles— A Code— St. Mark's — 
A Malediction — Gondolas — Venice by Night and Day. 

Chapter VIII. — Milan — A Masterpiece — Engineering Skill — 
Jealous of My German — The Prose of Poverty — Lucerne — 
Rigi — Mount Blanc. 

Chapter IX. — Under the Cart — Rain — Deluge of Mud — 
Eternal Snows— John Calvin — Shut Your Eyes. 

Chapter X.— Seeking a Box — " Du Nord" — Cathedrals — A 
Woman Talks — Champs Elysees—Bois de Boulogne, 

Chapter XI. — The Commune — Parthenon— Blot tmg Out the 
Sabbath— A Model of Beauty — Napoleon's Tomb. 

Chapter XII. — Vanity of Artists — Trianons — "Voleurs!" — 
Royal Rags. 

Chapter XIII. —Beau Brummel — "Shibboleth" — Among the 
Tombs — Going to Church — Music— " Big Ben" — Crown 
Jewels — The Kohinoor. 

Chapter XIV.— British Museum — Broken Vase— Stoke Poges 
Old Show. 

Chapter XV*— Edinburgh — Steell — Fair Picture — Burns — 
Charity—" Bobby." 

Chapter XVI. — Holyrood— Mary and Darnley — The Castle— 
Cragin-Doran. 

Chapter XVII.— The Jaunting Car — " Cloven Eden " — Phoenix 
Park — Ireland in America — Killarney. 

Chapter XVIII. — Blarney Castle— Kissing, Dangers of— Too 
Confidential — Bells of Shandon— The Lost Bird — Quar- 
antine. 



Wanderings in Europe. 



CHAPTER I. 




N the morning of July 13, 1892, I stood on 
the deck of the steamship Brittanic, look- 
ing down on the crowd of men and women 
on the dock. Each one had come to wish 
some friend " bon voyage" Some were in tears, 
others laughing, while the firmly settled features 
of many plainly showed that they were trying to hide 
their feelings, and restrain their tears. There were 
partings that morning that were sad and anxious. It 
reminded me somewhat of the day when my regiment 
left on the boat for the South. But then men were 
going and women remained. One familiar face turned 
kindly toward us. A member of my own congrega- 
tion, visiting in New York, honored us by coming to 

the dock to see us off. The bell warned all on board 

(?) 



8 WANDERINGS IN EUROPE. 

who did not want to be taken across the waters, to go 
on shore. The plank was pulled out ; the officers, in 
bright attire, were in their places, and the steamer 
began to move out from the pier. Then we lost sight 
of individual forms, but over the crowd there 
seemed to be a myriad of white doves brooding low. 
It was our friends waving their handkerchiefs. 
These signals were exchanged even when we were so 
far out that it was impossible to determine who it was 
that lingered there with the eye strained to get the 
last glimpse of the outgoing ship. 

For the first time I fully realized that I was going 
abroad, and that the waters of the Atlantic must be 
crossed and recrossed before I could see the loved 
ones of home and church. Those who have often had 
this experience lose the exquisite pain that stimulates 
the action of the heart, and gives a sort of ecstasy to 
the parting hour. It is a loss. The boy loses much 
when he speaks so often that he is no longer embar- 
rassed as he makes his address. He may feel more of 
comfort, when the embarrassment and excitement are 
gone, but his audience may feel far less of interest. 
"How did you feel when you left the shore ?" " How 
did you feel when you lost sight of land ? " One can not 
well answer. Ask the preacher how he felt when he 
delivered his first sermon. Ask the physician how he 
felt when he saw his first patient. Ask the lawyer 



CLOSE ADJUSTMENTS. 9 

how he felt when he first said in court, "May the 
Court please and Gentlemen of the jury." Ask your 
brother-in-law how he felt when at the twilight he told 
your sister his story of love, and solicited her hand. 
Of course they can not tell. There are some things 
to be enjoyed but once. You may have the same 
happenings again, but the same enjoyment — never. A 
speech, or visit, or proposal that does not have a little 
of the first emotion in it, will be dull and spiceless. 

But the care of seeing that my trunk is in " 34," and 
the worry of adjusting myself to live in a six-by-five 
room with a physician, whose down-town offices occupy 
more space than would be given to a hundred people 
on shipboard, bade all sentimental reflections " down," 
and unlike "Banquo's" ghost, they downed. You make 
up your mind to compel your body to be comfortable 
in discomfort. You imagine that the little shelf on 
which you are to sleep, will be a real luxury, since you 
are to be " rocked in the cradle of the deep." It is 
but little longer, and no wider, than the shelf on your 
dining-room sideboard; but here you are to spend more 
than seven nights, without enough air to last a deep- 
breathing mortal for two hours, and even that supply 
liable to be cut off if it becomes necessary to close the 
ports. 

Outward bound, we quickly pass Bartholdi's costly 
statue of "Liberty Enlightening the World," pass the 



10 WANDERINGS IN EUROPE. 

island where our ragged Ohio regiments landed in war 
time, when we were called from the front to suppress 
disloyalty in New York City, pass the old fort where 
political prisoners were held — out — out until the land 
is seen no more. 

"Why did you not stand by me and see the 
pilot leave the vessel? You have lost your last 
chance of getting back to Chicago ! It is too late 
now to repent. You must go with me !" The voice 
was that of my companion, Dr. Charles Gilbert Davis, 
of Chicago. He is the first person to whom I will 
introduce you, and that you may know how highly 
favored I was in having his company, his portrait has 
been secured for this book. The fact is, he was taking 
me with him, and he little imagined what a charge he 
had to keep, until it was too late for him to repent. 

We are in a new world. It is to be our home for 
eight days. We can hear nothing more from the 
continents of earth than we can from the planet Mars. 
We are really nearer Mars, for we can see it every- 
night. In the new condition of things, we begin to 
look about to see what sort of beings inhabit this new 
world. Who are to be our neighbors ? A dozen of 
them are from Chicago. We were too busy to know 
much about each other there, but here we have ample 
time to talk about our business and family descent, 
always leaving out the grand-uncles who came to 





'Otzzf 



LOVE AT THREE-SCORE. H 

America to escape the halter. We had often seen 
some of these neighbors. We had hurried past them 
on the streets of the city with a " good morning," or a 
grunt, just as we had much or little time for civilities. 
Here is a learned Judge, who, although on the shady 
side of sixty, has taken to himself a charming widow 
of twelve years standing. To see them wrapped up 
in their blankets, with their steamer chairs close 
together, one would think they were lovers of sixteen. 
Near them is a millionaire with his family. He is a 
great-hearted fellow who despises formality, and 
delights in horrifying English gentlemen by telling 
them that he is a " baker." Wherever he went he did 
not hesitate to tell the people of the superiority of 
America over any country in Europe. Through Mrs. 

F , who is a lady of wonderful refinement, I was 

introduced to the entire party, and we soon learned 
more of each other than we would have done had we 
lived as neighbors for a century in Chicago. 

There is but little going on to talk about for the 
first few days on the ocean, so we drift into per- 
sonal history with an occasional divergence into the 
regions of philosophy, or poetry, or theology, or poli- 
tics. But as we get acquainted with our new sur- 
roundings, we take up the old land themes. Our 
food and servants, and our neighbor's dress, and 
other people's business in general, occupy our leisure 



12 WANDERINGS IN EUROPE. 

hours. Some people settle down and try to read, 
but interruptions are so frequent that I have noticed 
a passenger with the same page of the book open 
day after day, only when a page back of the one 
usually opened, had been referred to, so as to get 
the connection. The little ocean community num- 
bered, all told, six hundred and twenty-two, but from 
some of these we were as rigidly separated by the 
rules of the vessel as men are divided by caste in 
China. They were second-cabin passengers. 

At eleven o'clock the first day out, seats at table 
were assigned us. My lot fell next to a Roman 
Catholic priest. He was fat and jolly ; freely offered 
absolution to everybody for everything they said or 
did. He was well fed, and if liquor would have made 
him so, might have been well drunk. Beer and wine, 
with an occasional stronger cup, freshened up his 
spirits and gave vigor to his conversation. Four 
meals and two or three extra luncheons were served 
every day. Many people ate as though they had 
never had a good square meal in all their lives before. 
Then they struggled up on deck, and, wrapped up 
like mummies in their steamer chairs, folded their 
arms and waited till, under the mysterious operations 
of nature, the luxuries of the table were transformed 
into blood. Others paced the deck from one end to 
the other, as though bent on some great enterprise. 



PORPOISES OR WHALES? 13 

Among these, a young Englishman walked bareheaded 
and resolute. A gentleman who had at one time some 
presidential aspirations, could be seen at almost any 
hour from daylight until ten o'clock at night, 
hurrying along the deck, yet making as little progress 
in getting anywhere as he did in getting to the White 
House. A young officer of the English army also 
was a distinguished deck-walker, and for some reason 
always kept the legs of his trousers rolled up, as one 
would do if walking through the mud. But possibly 
the meager wages that England pays her soldiers 
required that he should only wear out one part of his 
clothes at a time. Yet on a quiet voyage 

To-day is so like yesterday 

We take the lying sister for the same. 

One morning I was rewarded for early-rising by the 
sight of two whales, which came near the vessel and 
revealed their true nature — as some men do — by 
spouting freely. The doctor said that they were only 
porpoises, but fortunately other early-risers were with 
me to testify. Is it not strange that to a man who 
has not risen early enough to see it, a whale is only a 
porpoise ? I am not inclined to moralize overmuch, 
but on land I have heard many people talk the same 
way about other things. The fox said, " sour grapes.'' 
A man says, " only a porpoise ! " 



14 WANDERINGS IN EUROPE, 

After this, the inhabitants of our floating island 
began to be interested in the lower orders of creation. 
The fact that whales had been seen was telegraphed 
over the community, and all began looking for whales. 
We saw much that otherwise we would never have 
seen. An occasional dolphin delighted us with his 
graceful swimming. Porpoises by the hundred 
plunged along the sides of the vessel, like men in a 
circus tumbling for our amusement. The nautilus, 
best of sailors, set himself to float in our direction, 
and though occasionally turned over by the rude 
waves, soon righted himself and went on his 
course, drifting, like many on life's great ocean, not 
knowing whither. " Whither ! " I wonder if Professor 
Briggs noticed one of these before adopting his loose 
theology and writing his book. But, like the nautilus, 
the professor has probably discovered that even suc- 
cessful " drifting " requires some skill. As we stood 
by the prow of the vessel, the flying-fish rose in con- 
siderable numbers. My impression, from looking at 
the dried specimen, was that he only jumped. But 
he does much more. He darts from the waves like 
an arrow flying from the bow, rises a few feet above 
the water, and vigorously flapping his silvery wings, 
takes his flight away from real or imagined danger. 
When he feels himself safe, or when he is wearied by 
being too long out of his element, he buries himself 



"MOTHER CAREY'S CHICKENS.'' 15 

like a flash of light in the sea again. He remains out of 
the water probably half a minute, and flies at his best 
about six hundred feet. These fish are preyed on by 
dolphins, sharks, and gulls. Their lives are in constant 
peril. David's figure of the partridge on the mount- 
ains might have been as striking if he had used the 
flying-fish of the ocean, but people would not have 
been so well acquainted with it. 

The little petrel came to visit us in mid-ocean. 
Many surmisings were expressed as to how the birds 
rested at night, where they hatched their young, and on 
what they fed. The children have called them " Mother 
Carey's chickens." The name is a diminutive of Peter, 
and the light skimming motion of the birds over the 
water was supposed to represent Peter's walking on 
the waves. The name was illy chosen, for Peter never 
had faith enough to be at home on the waves as these 
birds are, and the rougher the waters the more at home 
the birds seem to be. They hatch their brood on the 
rocks, and when they are old enough take the whole 
family to sea. When they want to sleep, they simply 
tuck their heads under their wings and lie down on 
the waves, without any care where they may be when 
morning comes. They are ocean tramps, waiting at 
the back door of the ship to get what the household 
does not want, and then moving on, are as much 
at home one place as another. The sailors dread 



16 WANDERINGS IN EUROPE. 

their appearance, believing that their coming always 
presages a storm. Their lives are stormy, but they 
seem to live with much of inward peace. 

One day I was standing alone at the prow of the 
ship, looking for flying-fish, or whatever might show 
itself in the waters, when a hand was laid on my 
shoulder. I turned and saw a gentleman of some 
sixty summers, who immediately extended his hand 
saying, " I want to know you." 

"That is the privilege of all good-looking men 
and women who have the good taste to desire it," I 
replied. 

His home is in Lynchburg, Virginia. We soon 
found out that we had fought against each other in 
the War of the Rebellion. He was with the South 
in the conflict, and I with the North. We also 
discovered that we had been on opposing sides in 
several battles. Here was a new theme for conversa- 
tion, and we entered on it. In a short time I dis- 
covered what a noble nature had opposed me. He 
presented me to his wife, and I wondered if she would 
be as cordial as her husband had been. I determined 
to spring the mine at once and test her graces. 

"Madam, are you not glad that when I shot at 
your husband in the Valley of Virginia, I was so 
poor a marksman ? You might have been a widow — 
at least for a few years." 



A LOYAL FRIEND. 17 

She did not sneer ; she seemed not even to regard 
my attempt at wit, but answered, " Truly I am sir, 
and you will permit me to say that I thank God he 
was equally unskillful when he returned the shot." 
My new-made friend is a tobacco merchant, and pro- 
posed to ship me enough to last me for years. But I 
do not use tobacco, so I gave him my father's address 
and he agreed to make the offering to him. My father 
is not a preacher, and the vote of the church was in 
favor of large liberty in behalf of the eldership. But 
the old strife is forgotten and the old bitterness has 
died out of such noble natures as those of Major and 
Mrs. Winfree. 

But while I conversed with my friends, the doctor 
came up and positively affirmed that he had seen two 
whales on the opposite side of the ship. 

" Only porpoises, my son," I replied. His boomerang 
came home to him sooner than he anticipated. But he 
had witnesses, and the only thing left for me was to say 
that they could not have been so large as mine were. 
Why is it that on the sea, as well as on the land, we 
are so careful to make others feel comfortable and con- 
tented ? Is it because we are so easily satisfied with 
what we have, and minify our neighbor's good in 
order to keep up an exact equality, or possibly gain a 
little superiority? True, neither of us owned the 
whales we had seen, but we had seen them and that 



18 WANDERINGS IN EUROPE. 

gave us a sort of propriety in them. They were ours 
just as much, and more, than the possessions of earth 
are which we may have a title to, but which we have 
never seen and which we can never enjoy. 

As if to relieve the monotony, an occasional sail was 
seen, and at long intervals a steamer came in sight. 
One of the latter signaled us that she had seen icebergs. 
An iceberg is an interesting thing to read about. It 
brings with it a sort of chilly atmosphere that does 
not give promise of a pleasant meeting. We had 
only received this intelligence a few hours when we 
had our first experience of a fog. It was so dense that 
we could see but a few yards across the waters. 
Watchers were promptly on the lookout. The hoarse- 
throated horn sounded its warnings every two minutes, 
yet with the noise of the machinery and the waves, it 
was doubted whether the horn could be heard very 
much farther than we could see. Disagreeable as the 
sound of the fog-horn was, in itself, it was sweet as 
the voice of soft recorders to us, for it meant safety 
from collision with other vessels. But if an iceberg 
were encountered, there could be no protection. Our 
fog-horn would not warn it ofi. There is nothing at 
sea that is more dreaded than a fog. There may be 
no real danger, but there can be no assurance of safety. 
Let us have a dead calm, a stiff breeze, a violent 
storm, anything rather than a fog. We dread icebergs. 



THE FOG-HORN. 19 

They are cold and uninviting, Some people are 
like icebergs. You do not want to be near them. 
You do not want them to be near you. After awhile 
they may drift into the warm gulf stream of love and 
be subdued; but until that time comes, you need not 
cultivate their presence. And especially do we avoid 
them in a fog, when the way is uncertain. 

The horn sounds less frequently. Are the watchers 
growing careless ? Not at all. The clouds are lifting 
and the sunlight is seen on the sea. It has grown 
quite clear, and you can see an object ten miles distant. 
The fog-horn has ceased to blow. Its noise would 
be very offensive now that there is no danger. The 
note of warning, in time of peril, is to be desired, but 
some people are never so happy as when sounding the 
fog-horn under a clear sky, and over a calm sea. 
They attribute their morbidness to their faithfulness. 




CHAPTER II. 

HE sight of land caused considerable excite- 
ment in our little community, and the 
decks were soon crowded. We had seen 
land all our lives, until within the last 
few days, but passengers looked out at it 
with as much eagerness as though they had 
never seen it before. The rocky sentinels that guard 
the southern coast of Ireland were hailed in the dis- 
tance, and I confess to have shared in the general 
sentiment, and silently thanked God that He had 
made the dry land as well as the wide and deep sea. 
We lost all interest in the monsters of the deep and 
feasted our hungry eyes on the evergreen hills of old 
Ireland. Field-glasses were in demand, and light- 
houses were as carefully inspected as though we had 
never seen a lantern in all our life-time. 

" Home Rule " was the subject of earnest conver- 
sation. We were to be in Europe for two months, 
and we must begin to take an interest in European 
politics. The Irish priest came on deck and grew 

jubilant as he looked on his native land again, and 

(20) 



COURAGEOUS LADIES. 21 

talked with enthusiasm of the beauties of Tipperary. 
Within a half mile of us lay the wreck of the City 
of Chicago. The upper deck and rigging were above 
water. This unfortunate vessel, in the midst of a 
dense fog, had run directly against a rocky bank more 
than one hundred feet high. She had gotten out of 
her course, and while the watch were looking to- 
ward the left side for the light-house, she had veered 
so far to the left that the light-house was in advance 
and to the right. The ship was therefore steered 
directly against the cliff. Providentially, it was 
ordered that no rock was encountered until within a 
ship length of the cliff, and then she ran on a narrow 
shelving rock that held her from sinking. Had the 
vessel gone thirty feet either to the right or left, she 
must have gone down, and the loss of life would have 
been frightful. As it was, passengers and crew were 
saved, although the former lost most of their baggage. 
Forty thousand bushels of wheat were in her hold. 
The life-boats were manned, and most of the ladies got 
in them to be drifted about in the darkness for several 
hours. Others, however, escaped up the cliff by means 
of rope ladders. To them the darkness was an aid, for 
they could not see their peril, and made the ascent 
with comparative ease. Many of the ladies exhibited 
true American grit, and did not show the least nervous- 
ness as they left the boat for their gloomy ride. 



22 WANDERINGS IN EUROPE. 

I met a party of six under the care of Miss Ilalsted, 
of Yonkers, New York, who showed the spirit of 
courage in the midst of difficulties. One young lady 
of the party is a fine violinist and refused to part 
with her violin at the demand of a sailor. She 
simply clutched it under her arm, saying, "It does 
not weigh anything and I will keep it with me.'' 
After four hours, the party were landed at the foot of 
a high hill, up which they climbed on their hands and 
knees, the bright young violinist still clinging to her 
precious fiddle. After walking two miles to a little 
village, they were somewhat refreshed, but presented 
a very undignified appearance with torn and muddy 
dresses, water-soaked shoes, disheveled hair, and hands 
and faces that told how earnestly they had climbed. 
Bangs were at a discount, ruffles were rags, soap and 
water were luxuries. The party took the first train to 
Belfast, where they secured "hand-me-down" dresses, 
hastily trimmed other hats, and were off on their tour 
of the continent with as much zeal as though nothing 
unusual had happened them. 

At Queenstown many of our passengers left us, 
being taken off by a small tender that came alongside 
and received passengers and their luggage without 
stopping our ship. Our little community was being 
broken up. We parted from some of them with 
regret, with uttered prayers, and the warm pressure 



ANOTHER WRECK. 23 

of honest hands. Then the ropes were unfastened, and 
the little boat and great steamer drifted apart, attended 
by the usual waving of hats and handkerchiefs. 

The decks were thinned. We missed our friends, 
and the rest of the voyage was simply a looking 
for the end. How much like life it is ! The world 
is never quite the same to us when our dear 
ones have left us ; the skies never seem so bright, 
flowers have lost something of their perfume, and 
music does not cheer our hearts as of old. All may 
be as bright and sweet, but somehow we lose the 
capacity for enjoyment, and think more of the end. 
We learned that a fearful storm had prevailed on 
this part of the sea the day before ; while with us, a 
few hundred miles west, all was placid and calm. The 
truth of the report was soon confirmed, for we passed 
by a splendid vessel that had been driven on the 
rocks, and was even now being broken to pieces by 
the waves. Three brave fellows lost their lives in 
attempting to take off the crew. The path of safety 
was very narrow, but the vessel that had outridden 
many a storm could not be controlled, and was driven 
on the rocks. We can never argue that because 
dangers have been avoided we will surely come off 
safely from the next ones that threaten us. 

It was noon when we arrived at Liverpool, and in 
the confusion of disembarking and looking after our 



24 WANDERINGS IN EUROPE. 

trunks (you must call them " boxes "), formal "good- 
byes" were not generally spoken. The custom-house 
officers seemed careful in proportion to the unwilling- 
ness of the passenger to have his boxes examined. A 
minister had to pay a fine for carrying too many 
cigars for a preacher to smoke. With all her talk of 
free trade, England does not admit American tobacco 
without a heavy duty. 

Our little family was now entirely broken up, 
and by ones and twos spread over the land, going, 
like the children of Noah, wherever their inclination 
prompted, to meet occasionally, as we journeyed, 
and pass a hurried word or two in regard to the 
voyage over and the time of return. We spent but 
little time in Liverpool. Everything appeared to 
be solid and permanent. The docks of the city are the 
wonder of the world. They cover a space of four 
hundred acres of water along the Mersey. A hasty 
glance at these, or a small part of them, and we are 
on the way to the "booking" office. 

For the first time we find use for the old table of 
our childhood — £, s., d. It is exceedingly awkward, 
and my examination of the accuracy of the change 
given me must have been amusing or annoying to the 
agent. It is difficult to tell whether some Englishmen 
are amused or annoyed at you, for in both cases they 
are as sober and solemn as the grave. We have a 



THE COURTEOUS AGENT. 25 

double process to go through. We calculate the 
amount in pounds, shillings, and pence, and see that 
our change is correct, and then, to satisfy ourselves as 
to the cost of what we have purchased, have to reduce 
it all back again to dollars and cents. It is like 
studying our arithmetic over again. But I had 
resolved to do all in a thorough manner. Accord- 
ingly, I at once began to say " ha'penny " and 
" tuppence," and " tuppence ha'penny," as glibly as 
though I had been brought up in an English candy 
store. 

The first annoyance was to get our boxes " booked." 
I asked for a check, and the agent, after exacting 
" tuppence " for it, gave me a little scrap of paper, 
the stub of which had been pasted on the box. 

" Is it necessary for me to see that my box is put in 
the car?" 

" Naw." 

" Will it be necessary for me to look after it by 
the way ? " 

"Naw!" 

"Will I find it at the station at Stratford on the 
arrival of the train?" 

" Certainly. Have you never been away from home 
before ? " 

That rebuke quieted me, and we hurried to the cars. 
If quick-witted men had been put to work to invent 



26 WANDERINGS IN EUROPE. 

the worst possible system of railroading— -a system 
that would insure the least accommodation to the 
traveler and the greatest possible discomfort and 
insecurity, and at the same time the most expensive 
arrangement for the company — they could not have 
hit on a happier invention than an English railway. 
The cars themselves are ridiculously small, and are 
divided up into little compartments that will hold ten 
persons. You are locked in, without water, or any 
possibility of getting out, until the next stop is made, 
and the guard comes and unlocks the door. You 
may happen to be closeted with a maniac or robber, 
but you must stay in the company that has been 
selected for you. When night comes, a man walks 
along the top of the car and drops down a dim old 
lamp through an opening in the roof, near which it 
hangs, shedding on the top of your head its sickly 
light. 

Tickets are examined before you are put in the com- 
partment, or shortly afterward, and are not generally 
taken up until you arrive at your destination, and then 
the door is opened and the conductor takes them from 
you. On several occasions the train was stopped a 
mile or two out in the country, for the sole purpose 
of allowing the conductor to collect the tickets. 
Imagine such a thing in America ! When we arrived 
at Stratford, our boxes were not there. I took occasion 



STUPID RAILROADING. 27 

to tell the station agent what I thought of English 
railroads. He was polite and listened attentively 
while I told him of the assurances of the Liverpool 
agent. He apologized as well as he could and at once 
telegraphed along the line to find the boxes. His 
search was successful and the next train brought them 
to us. But in many cases you can not even book the 
boxes in this way. The road assumes no responsi- 
bility. A little tab is pasted on the trunk, and it is 
well for you to see that it is put on the cars, and you 
must be on hands to claim it when the train stops. 
But sometimes, in a long train where cars have been 
switched about, you can not tell where the box may be, 
and you have the delight of crowding along from one 
end of the platform to the other, looking at the lug- 
gage of five hundred passengers before you can pick 
out your own. There is no bell-rope attached to the 
cars for the conductor's use. He carries a little whistle 
about his neck, and with this signals the engineer 
when to move his train. We took frequent occasion 
to ridicule these things, and wondered why the East 
stupidly refused to learn from the West. A look of 
incredulity was apparent when we spoke of our sleep- 
ing, drawing-room, dining, and parlor cars, with a 
stenographer and type-writer and waiting-maid, and 
barber shop and bath-room attachment. 



28 WANDERINGS IN EUROPE, 

But there are some things we might learn from the 
East, and which we should learn. Human life is more 
sacred than it is with us. People are not allowed to 
walk across or along the tracks of the railway. At 
every station there is a way either above or beneath 
the tracks, by which to get from one side of the road 
to the other, and as a result of this, it seldom happens 
that anyone loses his life by being run down by an 
engine. 

The railway companies vie with each other in keep- 
ing the property that belongs to them in good order. 
The grass along the sides of the track is neatly cut, 
and at every station you will see, in summer time, 
flower beds in perfect order. Vines, well trained, are 
creeping about the doorways. Great roses, of varied 
color and sweet perfume, give an idea of Paradise 
itself. 

England is a beautiful country. Its farms are like 
gardens and lawns. Everything about its rural life 
gives the impression of carefulness and industry. It 
has a finished look that is in marked contrast with 
the great half-cultivated grain fields of the West. Its 
home life, if we may judge from external surround- 
ings, is peculiarly happy. There is no rush at table, 
such as we are accustomed to in America. The Eng- 
lishman takes plenty of time to eat and sleep and 



ENGLAND'S HOMES. 29 

extend good fellowship to his neighbor. As I looked 
at stately dwellings and lowly cottages, the words of 
Mrs. Hemans were recalled. 

The free, fair homes of England ! 

Long, long, in hut and hall, 
May hearts of native proof be reared 

To guard each hallowed wall ! 
And green forever be the groves, 

And bright the flowery sod, 
tVhere first the child's glad spirit loves 

Its country and its God ! " 




CHAPTER III. 

T was evening time when we reached Strat- 
ford-on-Avon, the birthplace of Shakes- 
peare, the immortal. A quaint old town 
it truly is, but its streets are well paved 
|pf u and scrupulously clean. The citizens have a 
sort of self-respect and local pride born of 
veneration for the great poet. We lodged at the 
Shakespeare house, an old inn with seven gables. 
Part of the old tavern which William visited too 
often, remains intact. The proprietress of this hotel 
is shrewd enough to make everything about it savor 
of Shakespeare. Every room is named after one of the 
characters prominent in his plays. " Take this gentle- 
man up to 'King Lear's 5 room 5 ' said the clerk. 
" Take that gentleman to ' Timon of Athens' ' room." 
On the door was the name of the character. I sat 
down, drew a long breath, and thought of the wreck 
that Ignatius Donnelly was trying to make. We vis- 
ited the house where William was born, and exam- 
ined the butcher shop, where, for a time, he helped 

his father. His dramatic talents must have been 

(30) 



A RECITATION. 31 

developed very early in life, and under peculiarly 
trying conditions. It is recorded of him that even in 
killing a calf he was tragical, and attended the blood- 
letting with a speech. We also visited his grave in 
the church at Stratford, and read the inscription on 
the slab, which has so often been quoted : 

Good friend, for Jesus's sake forbear 
To dig the dust inclosed here. 
Blest be the man that spares these stones, 
And curst be he that moves my bones. 

Leaving the old church, I came out into the 
grounds, where there is a fine bronze statue erected to 
his memory. On the sides of the pedestal there are 
several extracts from his writings. The reading of 
these excited in my mind a desire to repeat parts of his 
plays, with which I used, in younger days, to be famil- 
iar. I mounted a corner of the base stone and began. 
The doctor looked at me as though he were either dis- 
gusted with my display of myself or envious of my 
tragic skill. I could not determine which. The 
workmen noticed me and came near. The keepers, 
loafers, and sight-seers gathered about me. I had 
an audience and became still more tragicf. The 
doctor looked worried by the attention I was attract- 
ing. He had a reputation to keep up at home if I 
had not. "What will the fellow do next, I wonder?" 



32 WANDERINGS IN EUROPE. 

he muttered, and motioned for me to come away. 
But my audience was increasing in size and the inter- 
est was growing. I repeated the words of Prince 
Henry over the slain body of Percy, "IU-weaved 
ambition, how much art thou shrunk, etc." The 
doctor's mortification was growing in exact propor- 
tion to the interest I was exciting. Then a happy 
thought struck him. If I had humiliated him and 
sinned against his dignity, he would have revenge. 
He joined the group of listeners. I had captured him, 
too! But he gently tapped his head with his hand, 
and getting the eyes of my audience, looked sideways 
at me, and tapped his head again, saying, " You need 
not be alarmed at him. He is generally harmless. 
I am traveling with him and thought he was cured of 
these spells, bat this morning he got away from the 
hotel, and I find him here. You can quietly lis- 
ten to him until he wears himself out. Do not make 
any demonstration and he will be easily controlled. 
I will get him to the hotel again." I did not know 
just what the doctor was saying, but somehow my 
audience lost interest. The magnetic chain of sym- 
pathy between us was broken. I quit speaking, and 
then my friend came forward, and without a word ? 
took my arm and led me away. I noticed that my 
former audience opened the way for us, and made no 
demonstration whatever. We walked away as quietly 



WILLIAM AND ANNE. 33 

as though we were being taken to our own funerals. 
When we got out of sight and hearing, he confessed 
all except his mortification at the free exhibition I 
had been giving. 

We have found out that the people here seldom 
laugh. They do not understand jokes, and so we have 
arranged that we will laugh at each other's witticisms, 
though we may have heard them repeated a dozen 
times before. 

We were next driven to Anne Hathaway's cottage. 
In Shakespeare's house we saw the very niche in the 
chimney where William used to sit and dry his feet 
after his excursions into the premises of Sir Thomas 
Lucey. I have the pleasure of giving the reader 
a good picture of the Hathaway cottage, with its 
thatched roof. In it is the old red bench where he 
and Anne sat together and whispered words of love. 
The bench bears the marks of William's penknife, and 
it is probable that, during moments of embarrassment, 
he chipped the bench on which they sat, without any 
consciousness of the indelicacy of his conduct. But 
as Anne was twenty-six years old, she could easily 
forgive the rudeness of a lover of eighteen. I sat 
down on the old bench and tried to imagine the style 
of William's courtship, but the room was full of visit- 
ors, and the imagination was no wilder than on ordi- 
nary occasions. 

3 



34 WANDERINGS IN EUROPE. 

The cottage was in the possession of an old lady, the 
only living descendant of the Hathaways, who spoke of 
her honored kindred with great reverence. We drop- 
ped a shilling into her hand. Somehow people in Eng- 
land always keep the palms of their hands up when 
they meet yon. But she generously plucked a few 
pansies and gave them to us, reminding us that they 
grew in the yard at the Hathaway cottage. 

Some Ohicagoans came here early in the year 1892, 
and, whether in fun or earnest, I know not, proposed 
to buy the cottage to take to Chicago. The cor- 
poration of Stratford became alarmed. They at once 
purchased the old building, paying for it three thou- 
sand pounds. The old place was not worth five dol- 
lars, and it could not possibly have been removed 
to America. The thatched roof would have been 
pulverized before getting it to Liverpool. But the 
proposal brought a neat little fortune to the old lady, 
and she can live the rest of her days in comforL 
The corporation have, since our visit, taken possession 
of the place, and will get their sweet revenge by 
charging everyone a sixpence that cares to see the old 
bench and bedstead. I laughingly told some of the 
authorities that it would not have been possible to 
take the cottage so far in its dilapidated condition, 
but they replied that Chicago wanted the earth and 
everything on it and under it, and that they were 



A BOOK WITH A MISSION. 35 

determined they would have to get it all before they 
could take away the cottage, 

I left Stratford regretfully. The authorship of 
Shakespeare's plays is a matter of dispute. It would be 
esteemed a blasphemy to utter a doubt here where he 
lived. But someone did write a book with wonderful 
skill. It reveals an intimate knowledge of the higher 
revelation in which the workings of the human heart 
are explained. It is a book that both ennobles and 
debases. It went on its mission and still lives. It will 
be handed down through the centuries, and by coming 
ages regarded as it is to-day, the most wonderful pro- 
duction of the human brain, undirected by the 
inbreathings of the Spirit of God. 

It is but a short ride from Stratford to Warwick. 
Here we were to see the first substantial castle, though 
I had been building castles all my life. Those who 
built these great castles of stone were more foolish, 
for they cost much more labor than the sort we 
build with so much enthusiasm in our youth. The 
feudal lord must have both his substance and his 
subjects protected. He must have a fort to which 
he could resort, and where, even after defeat, he 
could bid defiance to his victorious enemies. Those 
who have fallen heir to these castles and the estates 
connected therewith, have in some instances improved 
and beautified them, but in others they have been 



36 WANDERINGS IN EUROPE. 

unable to keep them in repair, and they have fallen 
into ruins. Warwick Castle has been so well preserved 
that no one should miss a visit to it when in England. 
Look at the frowning walls and towers before you 
enter. Look at the outside before you have seen the 
inside, and then take another look at the walls after 
you have been within them. Let us enter. The door 
that now -swings in the arched way was not originally 
there. Look up at the stone archway and you will see 
the teeth or pointed spears of the grim old portcullis 
that tell of disappointed enemies and a garrison, safe, 
because the portcullis was dropped a moment before 
they reached the walls. Many acres are inclosed, 
and here and there in the walls the towers rise 
where the defenders of the castle assembled, and 
through long narrow openings shot their arrows and 
hurled darts at their enraged enemies. Within these 
towers, some of which are one hundred and forty feet 
in height, are narrow stone stairways, the steps of 
which have been worn by the feet of the old warriors 
and the new visitors. 

In these towers, too, are guard-rooms, where the 
watchers and fighters could retire, and where many 
a wounded man has received what care the skill of 
the time could bestow. Beneath these towers, or in 
deep vaults, are the dungeons where unfortunate pris- 
oners were left to live or die, the latter event being 



WARWICK CASTLE. 37 

by them more desired than such a horrible existence 
as was accorded them. Passing along a roadway, 
inside the castle walls, you see what work has been 
done here. The road has been cut through solid 
rocks and made level and smooth as the finest boule- 
vard. The masonry that has been constructed on 
either side has been unchanged for centuries, save 
that the ivy creeps all over it. Soon a delightful path 
is pursued amid stately cedars, like those of Lebanon. 
At length you come to a widely extended lawn, dotted 
here and there with beds of flowers, and skirting this, 
the waters of the Avon glide. You forget that you 
are inside the walls of a feudal castle as you walk still 
farther and come to a lovely lake on whose waters the 
swan convoys his family, like a proud ship leading a 
little fleet. You turn to the right and enter a struct- 
ure in which is kept a great marble vase, one of the 
treasures of the Earl of Warwick, the wonderful pro- 
portions of which, an Englishman, who looks nearly as 
old as the vase itself, begins in a monotonous voice to 
explain to you. The old man has his speech well in 
hand, and his voice rises and falls in uniform degrees 
for a little while, until at last it reaches a pitch from 
which he does not seem willing that it should descend, 
and he continues there to point out the vines and clus- 
ters and other carvings on the great object of his rever- 
ence. He has told his story so often that he knows 



38 WANDERINGS IN EUROPE. 

just where to pause, and there is a mathematical regu- 
larity in his intonations that once heard will never 
be forgotten. If I were to revisit the castle, I cer- 
tainly would not care to see the vase again, but I 
would desire to hear the squeaking old voice of the 
little interpreter, and am inclined to believe that he 
will live longer than he otherwise would, because he 
thinks no one could do justice to the earl's treasure if 
he were to die. The present Earl of Warwick lives 
in the castle, or a part of it large enough to accommo- 
date a hundred families. A large part of that which 
he occupies is opened to public inspection at all times, 
save when he is entertaining. 

Royalty and nobility live in constant fear of dyna- 
mite, hence the premises are well guarded. Old and 
reliable soldiers who have had experience in the detect- 
ive service are employed. You are courteously 
shown through dining-rooms and bed-chambers and 
halls and parlors, where you may see elaborately- 
framed pictures, painted by the old masters. There is 
seemingly no end of tables, secretaries, and escritoires, 
richly inlaid and curiously wrought. Mosaics of 
delicate workmanship, and tapestries fashioned with 
exquisite skill, excite your wonder and call forth your 
admiration. I have often seen displays of modern 
splendor, but in my wildest dreams I never pictured 
such treasures as are possessed by the Earl of Warwick. 



THE EARL'S FURNITURE. 39 

And yet I have asked myself if there is not a certain 
sort of vulgarity in making these displays of the pos- 
sessions of a family to strangers, and that for a shilling 
a person. The castle, except on great occasions, is 
only a museum, and not in any true sense a home. 
Imagine, if you can, some wealthy and cultured Ameri- 
can citizen inviting the world to come and look through 
his parlors and bad-chambers and halls, at twenty-five 
cents a visit, I presume many of us would go to look, 
but it would be without much reverence for the pro- 
prietor. There is something here to interest all varie- 
ties of taste. One who is weary of paintings and 
furniture and statuary, may probably be amused by a 
visit to the side-board, and an inspection of the china. 
Those who have more delight in the rigid features of 
the Warwick history, can examine the old armor or try 
on the iron helmet, or take both hands and lift the rude 
sword, or gaze into the depths of the mush-pot of the 
giant of Warwick. What a hard head and stiff neck, 
what strong muscles and wonderful digestive powers 
the old fellow must have had ! 

Kenilworth Castle, but a few miles distant, is a 
complete ruin. No one can visit it without being 
impressed with the magnificence that once reigned 
there. Sir Walter Scott has immortalized it. In the 
marks of time on its crumbling walls and desolate 
dungeons and bold towers, we may learn something of 



40 WANDERINGS IN EUROPE. 

belittled greatness and fading glory. God alone is 
great. The stone pillars that supported the floor of 
the banquet hall are standing, but every particle of 
the floor is gone. The revelers have been sleeping 
for centuries. There is a poetic beauty in these old 
ruins. A hundred school children, off for a holiday, 
were climbing over the walls, peering into the dun- 
geons, or rollicking on the grass. A young couple 
had sought out a quiet place in a half-perished door- 
way, to play over again the old scene between " Lei- 
cester " and the " Queen," when the faithless husband 
whispered words of love in the not unwilling ears of 
his gracious sovereign. A boy, who may have been 
the direct descendant of Scott's " Flibbertigibbet," was 
turning handsprings where once royalty was enter- 
tained. A flock of sheep, some of whose ancestry 
may have been slaughtered by the earl on the famous 
visit of Elizabeth to his castle, were nipping the 
grass, all unconscious of the dignity of their grazing 
on such hallowed soil. The expenditure of three 
million dollars had not been enough to keep the castle 
in repair. Its gates are guarded now simply to secure 
sixpence from the tourist. The great festival held 
here in honor of Queen Elizabeth, in 1475, and so 
graphically pictured by Scott in his half-historic novel, 
marked the greatest day of the glory of Kenilworth 
Castle. In no place is the ivy more beautiful, as it 



LIVING CHARITY. 41 

creeps over the crumbling walls, and, like a gentle 
friend, seeks to shield them from vulgar gaze. It is 
nature's mantle of charity, concealing, and even 
beautifying, what it can not restore. 




CHAPTEE IV. 

HE London papers were filled with accounts 
of the cholera in Russia, and there was lit- 
tle doubt that it was moving westward. If 
we remained long in England it would not 
be prudent to cross the North Sea, We there- 
fore hastily determined on our future course, 
and started out toward the dreaded disease, with the 
purpose of visiting parts of Germany and getting 
away before the cholera put in its appearance. Expe- 
rienced travelers laughed and shook their heads signifi- 
cantly as we spoke of going by Harwich to Rotter- 
dam. I learned in a few hours the cause of their 
significant looks. It was ten o'clock at night when we 
stepped on board the little steamer at Harwich. The 
luxury of a night's sleep, after the fatigue of the day, 
was soon to be realized, and at once we repaired to 
our state-room, for which we had telegraphed from 
London. The state-room was a little larger than four 
steamer trunks. It was higher and wider than the 

pile of trunks would be if economically packed. 

(42) 



MAL DE MER. 43 

Within this, four of us were stowed away like sardines 
in a box. I was soon asleep from sheer weariness, but 
found it convenient to get awake. The boat reminded 
me of a nervous child. The mother dreads to see it 
begin to move. It foretells a time of tossing and 
tempest. The child stirred! Such a restless boat I 
never had traveled on. It got on one side for a second 
or two, and you adjusted yourself to this, in the belief 
that by lying at the proper angle you could surely 
sleep, but quick as a flash it dispelled the vain hope. 
It turned on the other side, and you turned with it. 
Then it tdssed off the watery spread and sat up. It 
stood upright. It fell down and got up. It waltzed 
over the waves until it grew dizzy, and sat down with 
you again. It danced like a barefooted boy that has 
unintentionally stepped on a wasp's nest, or has found 
the injudiciousness of interfering with a bumble-bee 
when it is gathering sweetness from a red clover blos- 
som. The waters ran over the deck and swished up 
against the port windows. Then one-fourth of our 
state-room began to groan. It was something like the 
groan of Ajax when iEneas began breaking off bushes 
with which to cover the altar, and found out that in 
place of sap flowing therefrom, it was blood that came 
from the body of Ajax, and the bush was the growth 
of a spear that had pierced his body. I do not recall 
the Latin accurately, but remember the Irishman's 



44 WANDERINGS IN EUROPE. 

account of the fright of the rash man who pulled away 
the branch when he saw the blood: 

" My hair stood on end, and my voice stuck in my 
throat, and niver a word could I say at all." 

The groan was not an English one. The gentleman 
is a professor in a school where foreign languages are 
taught. It was a groan unlike anything I had ever 
heard before. It was followed by another and then 
another. I thought the fellow must be dying, and 
stirred up the doctor. The doctor was sound asleep 
and was hard to waken, but I wakened him. I did 
not propose to be tossed about in that rough sea and 
listen to that unearthly groaning all by myself. It 
was too lonesome. I wanted company. The professor 
was not a total abstainer. He believed that he ought 
to take brandy for his stomach's sake, and he took it. 
But his stomach did not propose to yield the struggle 
to anything so weak. The battle lasted till daylight, 
and I had to lie there and listen to it with that pecul- 
iarly soothed nervous feeling in the epigastric regions 
that a companion's sea-sickness always produces. But 
the doctor did not get asleep again. Though I could 
not see him, there was consolation in the fact that he 
was wide awake. He got up and went on deck. 
When he came below again, he reported three hun- 
dred sick ! I warned him of the dangers of exaggera- 
tion. He repeated his assertion. I told him there 



MONEY TALKS. 45 

were only two hundred and fifty aboard, and I knew 
one who was not sick. He replied that he was that 
happy individual. I thought it was I. 

" But how did you make out three hundred when 
there are only two hundred and fifty aboard ? " 

" Several of them are sick enough to count twice," 
he replied. 

And the professor thought we were talking of him. 

We had scarcely left Rotterdam when we had our 
first experience of the difficulties attending travel in 
a country of whose speech we were wholly ignorant. 
A gentleman from Chicago and his accomplished wife, 
who were taking a tour of Europe, were on the tram 
with us. The gentleman's countenance betokened 
perplexity. His wife seemed to take in the ridiculous 
side of the affair as well as the serious. There was 
something wrong with the tickets, which the conductor 
insisted on explaining in Dutch. The gentleman 
answered in the purest Anglo-Saxon. The conductor 
did not understand the passenger, and the passenger 
did not understand the conductor. The conductor 
thought the passenger was stupid, and the passenger 
was sure the conductor was dumb. An appeal to 
the German language was useless, for the Hollander 
knew as little of that as he did of English. The way 
to end a dispute of this kind is always to put your 
hand in your pocket and hold out enough money. If 



46 WANDERINGS IN EUROPE. 

the coin you offer is large enough to talk, the expla- 
nation is soon made by the simple transfer of the 
money to your neighbor's pocket. 

It was under these circumstances we met Mr. and 
Mrs. Case, and we had occasion to be profited by the 
acquaintance many days afterward. 

I deeply regret that we left the Hotel Des Indes 
without getting a photograph of the head porter. He 
is a little over five feet in height, and is built as square 
as a stick of stove wood. He stood at the doorway, 
on the arrival of the carriage, dressed in a suit of sky- 
blue. His cap was of the same color, and, besides the 
name of the hotel, had on it several bands of gold lace. 
About the sleeves of his coat were three bands some- 
what wider than those on his cap. The moment his eyes 
met ours he lifted his right hand to his cap, extended 
his arm at right angles to his body, held the arm 
in that position several seconds, and then let the hand 
come to his side with as much fixedness of motion as 
a pump handle has when being lowered to the stock. 
He was as sober as a grave-yard. His person did not 
bend in the least. He was the personification of por- 
terial dignity. He quietly ordered the subordinates 
to their duty, and in broken English assured us that 
we were welcome guests at the hotel. When we 
approached him for information, or gave him a few 
pfennigs, he always saluted us with the same stately 



UNDER THE OAKS. 47 

dignity. I felt somewhat awed in his presence, and 
wondered if he were not a relative of the little Queen 
of Holland, but the doctor assured me that he was 
only the porter, and I was comfortable. 

We got on the top of the tram car and rode out to 
Scheveningen, a sea-side resort, three miles distant. 
The trip to this watering-place is one never to be for- 
gotten. It takes you under the leafy boughs of forest 
trees that grow so thickly above you that you seldom 
get a glimpse of the sun. The car goes so near the 
trees that you may reach over and touch their trunks, 
while the branches are cut away above so as to leave 
but a few inches between them and your hat. You 
may look down this fair bower for two miles and see 
it grow narrower at the further end. It is straight as 
an arrow, and is not equaled anywhere in Europe. 
This at least is the testimony of those who have 
traveled most widely. The peasantry wear wooden 
shoes, and old men and women walk along the streets 
leaning on staves, and wearing shoes whose dull thuds 
betoken the absence of all elasticity. Young men and 
women walk gaily along with the firm and resolute 
rapping of wooden heels on the sidewalk, while the 
clatter of the little children's shoes sounds merrily, and 
tells of poverty and contentment. 

Passing over a gracefully sloping hill, there is pre- 
sented a picture that must awaken interest. Here 



48 WANDERINGS IN EUROPE. 

surge the waters of the North Sea, More than a 
thousand people are gathered together on the sand. 
Temporary tents are erected, in which all sorts of 
trinkets are sold. Half the multitude are sitting in 
little willow chairs that have a grotesque appearance. 
If you will make a large clothes-basket, with one end 
square, in place of oval, and in this end have a willow 
seat, so that you might sit in it when the basket is on 
the square end, you have a model of these resting 
places of the Hollanders by the sea-shore. They are 
comfortable and light, and may be readily turned in 
any desired direction. They did not seem to be well 
fitted for lovers, since they accommodate but one per- 
son. But it is easy to join them together, and the heart 
may be won by the flash of the eye, and possibly by 
low-spoken Hollandish words. My impression, how- 
ever, was shown to be false, as a young lady, who 
was familiar with the habits of the people, said that 
there was plenty of room in one of these little sitting- 
baskets for two persons, if they were sufficiently 
attracted to one another. The pleasure seekers seemed 
to be enjoying their leisure hours in a rational way. 
Ladies were reading, sleeping, conversing, knitting, or 
working embroidery, while the little children were 
digging in the sand about them. 

We wanted to go in bathing, and had some difficulty 
in finding the proper place to hire suits, and then the 



RESCUE^ FROM DANGER. 49 

right way to get into these suits. We finally entered 
a large wagon, which was really a cottage on wheels, 
where we prepared ourselves for the sea. A sturdy 
old man dragged the wagon down into the water, and 
when you opened the door of your little apartment 
you stepped into the water about your knees. There 
is no satisfaction in bathing where one has to lie down 
to get the surf washed over him. We went out and 
fought waves breast high. The wagoner came wading 
out, and by violent gestures warned us to go no 
further. It was rather hard to obey; but, supposing 
that he knew more about this than we did, and not 
knowing how to deal with Dutch waters in case of 
danger, we came to him. He pointed to his breast, 
and there was a gold medal, given him by the govern- 
ment, for saving twenty people from drowning. I did 
not fully understand him, but supposed he said that 
they were venturesome fools, like some other people 
he had to deal with. Why he did not encourage us 
to go out farther, and get another medal, I can not tell. 
Some people are lacking in the spirit of enterprise. 
But it was a singular spectacle — the honest old bare- 
footed man, with his wet clothes all in tatters, and 
yet about his neck a gold medal of great value. We 
had no medals on hand, so we gave him twenty pfen- 
nigs (four cents) for his kindness to our families in 
saving our lives. A horse fair is held at Scheveningen, 

4 



50 WANDERINGS IN EUROPE. 

which the little girl Queen, eleven years old, was 
to grace on the morrow by her presence. But as 
we had seen queenly little girls forty years ago, we 
had no desire to see a child who was to be used as an 
advertisement for a horse fair ! 

After buying a pair of wooden shoes for myself, 
which nearly half filled the doctor's box, we returned 
to The Hague. A pleasant evening drive about the 
city, and a vain search for the grave of Barneveldt, 
closed up the exercises for the evening. In the morn- 
ing we visited the Royal Museum, and were delighted 
with the splendid exhibition of pictures. The fame 
of " Paul Potter's Bull " is well merited, and is not to 
be judged by the so-called copies that are to be found 
in so many places. But it is train time, and so bidding 
our friends adieu, and tipping a half-dozen people at 
the hotel, and acknowledging the profound salute of 
the porter, we arrived at the depot, only to find out 
that we had tickets by another road, and that our 
train did not go until in the afternoon. We returned 
to the city, and called on the United States minister. 
He lives in seclusion, not speaking the language, and 
having no household to share his perplexities and 
entertain his visitors. We assured him that we did 
not want to borrow money, which, when he heard, he 
expressed himself willing to loan us. We did not 
want to be shown about the city, or presented to the 



THE ARTISTS WALK. 51 

little Queen. He breathed a sigh of relief at that, 
but would have been delighted to take us everywhere 
and tell us everything. We had been paying so many 
people in the city for services not needed, that we felt 
it would be out of place not to give him something 
too, and so we had called to pay him our respects. 
He had lived so long among these solemn Hollanders, 
that he had forgotten how to laugh, but, in order to be 
respectful, forced himself to smile. 

We went back to the hotel, and received the same 
formal, soldierly salute from the porter that we had 
on our first arrival. It was somewhat of a recom- 
pense for the disappointment we had experienced. 
As we strolled about under the lime trees, we met 
Mrs. Case, who, while her husband busied himself 
with the barber, had started out with her kodak to 
catch a few pictures. I detected in the smile she 
gave us something more mischievous than a recog- 
nition. It meant, in plain Chicago words, which 
she was too polite to use : " Gentlemen, you got 
left ! " We joined her in the artist's walk, and came 
on that island described by Motley as : " Fringed with 
weeping willows and tufted all over with lilacs, labur- 
nums, and other shrubs, in the center of a minia- 
ture lake." Now, as on the morning when Barneveldt 
was executed, " the white swans were sailing to and 
fro over the silver basin." We knew something more 



52 WANDERINGS IN EUROPE. 

of the situation than before, and after seeing that the 
lake was duly kodaked, went to the court-yard where 
Barneveldt was executed. No wonder that residents 
of The Hague do not care to point strangers to 
that spot where the cruelty and injustice of Maurice 
disgraced the noble House of Orange, and left on his 
own name the stain of a patriot's blood. Here, on 
that bright May morning, 1619, sat the rude soldiers 
casting dice as to the destiny of the soul of Barne- 
veldt. On these walls were displayed caricatures of 
the noblest statesman of Holland. I can almost see 
the old Advocate, more than seventy years of age, 
walking out on the scaffold, as he leans heavily on 
his staff, and looks with wonder over the three thou- 
sand ignorant people who believed him guilty of 
treason to the state. Here is the very spot where his 
voice, broken with sorrow and disappointment, yet 
sweet as the words of the martyr, is heard: "This, 
then, is the reward of forty years' service to the state !" 
There, where my friend is pointing her kodak, is the 
spot where he kneels with his face toward his house, 
and, while the executioner draws his sword, bends 
over the sand that is to drink in his blood, saying 
with a firm voice : 

" Christ shall be my guide. O Lord ! my Heav- 
enly Father, receive my spirit." 



A TABLET IN THE WALL. 53 

It is proper also to record the fact that the wife of 
the Advocate never petitioned for her husband's par- 
don, because she knew he had committed no offense, 
and to have sued for pardon would have been the 
admission of a crime. A tablet in the wall of the 
court-yard records the fact of his death. Blessings 
come to us in the guise of disappointments. I was 
glad that we did not get off on the morning train. 
We had an opportunity of formally bidding the head 
porter another farewell, slipping a small coin into his 
hands, and the grave old man was just bringing down 
his hand to his side, as he had done in the morning, 
when our carriage turned the corner. Holland has 
been rescued from the sea, and might easily be given 
back to its dominion again. In fact this was done 
when the brave people warred against Spain. The 
country is very fertile, and in many parts the waters 
of the canals are kept pure by wind-mills, which 
pump it out to higher levels. 




CHAPTER V. 

S we travel southward, toward Cologne, we 
find it convenient to select compartments 
where smoking is not permitted. Here I 
take my first lesson in Dutch. On the 
doors of certain compartments you will see 
the words, "Niet Rooken." The interpre- 
tation of this is, " No smoking permitted. " Just here 
I must say that the most selfish habit on earth is that 
of the smoker. He gets to windward of you, and, no 
matter how mean the quality of his cigar or pipe, 
whiffs away, with the smoke blowing in your face. 
He is seldom polite enough to ask if the use of 
tobacco is unpleasant to you. He does not care. But, 
of all places in the world, tobacco smoke in Holland 
is the vilest. The smoker will even come into the 
compartment where smoking is forbidden, and fumi- 
gate you until you attract his attention and point to 
the " Niet Rooken " on the wall, and then he casts a 
look of contempt at you, accompanied by a dismal 
grunt, that shows in what estimation you are held. It 

is more than possible that someone may read this 

(54) 



A TEA-PARTY. 55 

page with a cigar between his lips, who will stop just 
here to shake off the ashes, and give a similar utter- 
ance to his feelings, suggesting that such delicate peo- 
ple had better stay at home. But in the fact that he 
is too far away for me either to be stifled with the 
smoke or hear the criticism, I find consolation. There 
is no stop made for dinner. There is no opportunity 
to get refreshments, unless you rush from the car and 
are back again in three minutes. Beer is peddled 
along in glasses, and is purchased by passengers, who 
give up the glasses at the next stop that is made. The 
compartment was crowded. We discussed freely the 
condition of Europe, and especially the lack of ordinary 
comforts on the railways. We were hungry, and there 
is a sort of traditionary belief that when men are hungry 
they are not amiable. Two English ladies proposed 
to give us a regular tea-party. We gladly accepted, 
and a traveling basket was drawn from under the 
seat. The contents of that basket were a revelation. 
A jar of water was produced. A bright little tea-ket- 
tle followed. A lamp was lighted, and in a few min- 
utes the kettle was boiled, and, with spoons and knives 
and forks and sugar and sandwiches, we had a refined 
little tea-party. The doctor's soul seemed to revive 
with the luxurious living. He repeated poetry and 
talked so much philosophy that I became alarmed for 
his safety. Tea is the true stimulus. The dish-washing, 



56 WANDERINGS IN EUROPE. 

under the circumstances, was rather embarrassing. 
My idea, that the cup must be washed without touch- 
ing it with your hands, could not well be executed, 
and there was a lively discussion as to which one of 
the party was the most skillful. The ladies had been 
benefactresses. They had fed the hungry. But, as it 
proved some days afterward, they had also been cast- 
ing bread on the waters, for the doctor's medical coun- 
sel was sought and freely given in the serious sickness 
of one of them. As for myself I had no way of 
expressing my gratitude except by the heartiness with 
which I partook of the novel repast. 

We experienced on this trip the annoyances of the 
continental custom-house. One must take all his lug- 
gage from the compartment into the custom-room, 
to be examined, and then skirmish about in search 
of his box, and, having found it, open it and his 
satchel, and endure the agony of seeing sacred apparel 
handled by officious officials. Then he fees a porter 
to take back the box to the train, and attempts to pass 
out. A guard prevents him, and points to another 
room through which he must go. This room is sim- 
ply a beer hall. The door from it to the platform is 
locked, and he must remain there fully fifteen min- 
utes, breathing a foul air that is doubly polluted with 
the fumes of tobacco and the stench of fermented 
liquors, before he can return to his car. Some 



CATHEDRAL AT COLOGNE. 57 

Americans fall in with the custom of the country, 
and spend the time drinking beer. Others use rather 
inelegant, but strongly expressive, adjectives; while a 
few, like myself, give themselves to quiet meditation, 
on the comforts of home and the glory of American 
citizenship. 

The cathedral at Cologne is the most impressive 
structure of the kind in Europe. Its proportions are 
on a scale that surprise us, though we had been 
expecting something marvelous. It is four hundred 
and fifty feet long, two hundred and one feet wide, 
and one of its towers is five hundred and eleven feet 
high. There is nothing that approaches it in the fair- 
ness of its proportions. The parts seem to be in per- 
fect harmony with each other. In 1795 the French 
used this magnificent structure to store away hay in. 
It is a long road that has no turnings in it. In 1870 
the Germans had their revenge, if the word can be at 
all used in regard to a house of w T orship. Remem- 
bering the insults that had been heaped on them by 
the French, seventy-five years before, they made a bell 
for their cathedral, weighing twenty-five tons, out of 
cannon captured from the French. Every time the 
bell rings they may recall their hatred and their 
triumph. Much of this building is used for shrines 
and statues and confessionals. The stained-glass win- 
dows represent Bible incidents, particularly those in 



58 WANDERINGS IN EUROPE. 

which the Yirgin figured. Long after the special 
services were over, occasional worshipers lingered on 
their knees, with troubled faces, looking with tear- 
dimmed eyes at the picture or statue of some favorite 
saint. Under a slab in the pavement lies the heart 
of Marie de Medici. The work of construction was 
carried on through several centuries, and besides the 
gifts of the rich and poor, vast sums were added 
through the profits of lotteries. The slowness of the 
work of construction could fairly be attributed to the 
vastness of the undertaking, but some zealous devotees 
attributed it to the devil, who became jealous and 
vowed that it should never be completed. But the 
means resorted to would seem to indicate that, either 
the devil was not jealous or else that his kingdom 
must have been divided against itself, as the lottery 
is under his special protection. 

What magnificent temples ignorance is willing to 
build to that very power by which it is enslaved ! 
The cathedral at Cologne has been erected by the 
contributions of kings, and by the sacrifices of the 
poor and needy. But it is a law everywhere prev- 
alent, that the more we sacrifice in behalf of any 
cause, the dearer it becomes to us, and that where we 
give but little we love but little. The protestant 
world has much to learn, not in the way of erecting 
costly material structures, but in enlarged offerings to 



PAYING THE PORTERS. 59 

the cause of Christian evangelization and consequent 
freedom. 

As there was but little of interest on the Rhine, 
between Cologne and Bonn, we determined to go by 
rail to the latter place and take the steamer there to 
Mayence. This arrangement enabled us to sleep as 
long as we desired in the morning, and have ample 
time to overtake the boat on the river. The tourist 
who makes his first trip will be annoyed and confused 
with the number of persons to whom he must give 
money for services. He does not know very well 
how little he is giving, and he is equally in ignorance 
of the number of hands that will be reached out to 
him. This was specially manifest on our Rhine trip. 
The fees exacted are small ; so were the flies in Egypt, 
but they were unnumbered. Arriving at Bonn, we 
hired an expressman to take our luggage across to the 
boat, while we sauntered leisurely along the pleasant 
walk between the station and the boat landing. When 
we arrived at the landing, we found our boxes at the 
farther side of the street from the boat. The porter 
of the boat could not cross the street for the boxes. 
The porter on the street dare not carry them on the 
boat. The street porter had to be feed for taking 
them across the street. The expressman dare not 
leave them on the side next the river. The boat 
porter was paid for carrying them to the boat. The 



60 WANDERINGS IN EUROPE. 

baggageman on the boat was paid for putting a tab 
on them that marked their destination. At Mayence 
the boat porter was again feed for carrying them to the 
hack. The hackman received his usual tip, and at 
the hotel the porter was paid for taking them to our 
room. The amount necessarily paid was very little, 
and one felt his importance in having so many hired 
servants to do his bidding. Americans generally give 
five times too much, and, of course, no change is 
returned. We are, however, rapidly adopting this 
pernicious habit at home, and in some places where 
men are supposed to be hired by wealthy corporations, 
they actually pay something for the privilege of doing 
the work. No one begrudges the poor fellows the 
little they receive, but it is annoying to be compelled 
to hire all the servants at a hotel where you have paid 
your bills in full. The only one in Europe who 
refused an offered gratuity, was a lady clerk in Paris, 
who courteously handed back the coin, saying: 

" I have resolved to make my employer pay my 
salary, and then I can be courteous without sacrific- 
ing my dignity. I hope you will not think me 
impolite, but what I have done has been without hope 
of reward." • 

The ten hours' ride on the Rhine from Bonn to 
Mayence is full of interest. The river runs between 
two mountain regions and the valley is so narrow that 



VINEYARDS ON THE HILLS. 61 

the hills on both sides of the river rising several hun- 
dred feet above yon, are seen in all the minute details 
of rock, ravine, and vineyards. Rugged as these 
mountains are, the enterprising Germans have discov- 
ered that, by making terraces on their sides, little vine- 
yards may be cultivated. These terraced plots vary 
in size from a few feet to several acres. The stone 
walls that keep in the soil so that it may not be washed 
down the mountain sides, have been the work of cent- 
uries. The soil itself has been carried up from the 
banks of the river on the heads of toilers, many of 
whom were women. 

These little vineyards have no uniformity in shape 
or size, and the divisions between them are distinctly 
marked. A wall, forty feet in height, may have been 
built to support a space of half an acre, and next to it 
a wall, ten feet high, to form the outer foundation for 
a dozen vines. This variety of size and shape gives to 
the mountain sides a peculiar charm. But that which 
awakens the deepest interest is the ruins of the old 
castles, which must have flourished as early as the 
twelfth century. They are on the tops of mountainous 
bluffs which, seen from the river, appear almost inac- 
cessible. How the stones were ever carried to such 
heights is a mystery to us. These ruins are eloquent 
lessons that tell of unrequited toil, suffering, ambi- 
tion, blighted fortunes, and vanished hopes. Legends, 



62 WANDERINGS IN EUROPE. 

that may be more than half historic, still exist. They 
tell the old story of love and jealousy, and disappoint- 
ment and crime. Some of these legends are full of 
pathos and have been the models for modern novelists. 
A single illustration will be sufficient to show how full 
of the poetry of tenderness some of them are. On the 
summit of Drachenfel's Mountain, which is nine hun- 
dred and ten feet high, are the ruins of Drachenfel's 
Castle, built in the twelfth century. Roland, a young 
nephew of Charlemagne, came to the castle. He did 
not come as a lover, for he knew nothing of the inhab- 
itants of it. The knight who then owned the castle 
received the young man favorably and urged him to 
remain with him. The youth, pleased with the enter- 
tainment, consented. So favorably did Roland impress 
his host, that he brought his daughter to the table, 
where she was formally presented to the young and 
gifted Roland. It was the old story of love at first 
sight. In all his life Roland had never seen one 
whose beauty and grace so filled his soul. The 
maiden, whose name was Hildegunde, was an only 
daughter, the pride of her father's life. Fill in, as 
you choose, the hours of their courtship, the under- 
standings and misunderstandings. Nothing is new in 
love, and nothing strange in it, and nothing false. 
Anything you may desire to say has been said a thou- 
sand times. After all their meetings and partings, 



A SAD PRESENTIMENT. 63 

the " pledge was snatched from her finger feignedly 
resisting." And when the pledge is once secured it is 
an easy matter to get possession of the heart. Roland 
and Hildegunde, on Drachenfels, were as near heaven 
as it is permitted mortals to be, A new castle was 
planned. Then came a message from Charlemagne 
ordering Roland to hasten to Spain and lead a host 
against the Saracens. The plans of the lovers were 
disconcerted. As a true knight he dare not hesitate, 
and yet, Hildegunde believed that Roland would never 
return. She did not doubt his loyalty and devotion 
to her. She saw in her dreams the hero of the war, 
her lover, surrounded by the cruel Saracens, who 
fought like demons, and when Roland could no longer 
maintain himself against the fearful odds, he fell, with 
his face to the foe, gasping even in death the name of 
Hildegunde. The presentiment of the lady, that had 
taken such definite form, at last was realized to her. 
Roland was wounded, and soon after the tidings came 
that he was dead. Her father saw and shared her 
grief, not only because of sympathy with his daughter 
but because of his attachment to the noble youth who 
was to claim her hand. Hildegunde, believing that 
her lover was dead, determined that she, too, would 
die even a more cruel death. She would die to the 
world in the gloom of the cloister, A few months 
after she had left her father's castle, a distinguished 



64 WANDERINGS IN EUROPE. 

visitor arrived and was ushered into the presence of 
Heribert, the father of Hildegunde. Heribert first 
uttered a cry of joy, but instantly bowed his head, 
covering his face with his hands. To Roland's eager 
inquiries for Hildegunde, he at last said, with a 
hoarse voice, "She is now the Bride of Heaven." 
Roland, stricken dumb, left the castle. He at once 
began the erection of a castle, Rolandseck. This over- 
looked the convent, and he hoped that sometimes, 
from it, he might see Hildegunde, as she went from 
the little chapel. He saw her daily, but she gave 
him no token of recognition. One morning she did 
not appear, and the day following he saw the sad pro- 
cession bearing forth her body for sepulture. She was 
now twice dead to him, and his mind wandered as 
well as his body. Soon after, he was found cold in 
death, but his glazed eye was turned toward the spot 
where he had last seen his beloved Hildegunde. 

This is substantially the story as it will be told, 
allowing for the license which I have taken with 
a legend. But one great lesson the story teaches, 
even if the tale itself be without foundation in fact, 
and that is the hateful system of both old and new 
Rome, that teaches its deluded votaries that such 
cruel sacrifices are pleasing to Him who came to 
brighten and beautify life, and who ordained that true 
love is never to be laid on any altar of sacrifice. 



BINGEN ON THE RHINE, 65 

The boat was crowded with tourists. We ordered 
our meals on the forward deck, and looked out with 
wonder and delight at mountains, to whose very sum- 
mits the vines were growing. The day was perfect, 
and the sunlight and shadows recalled the legends of 
the Rhine. 

I looked out dreamily over the scene that, for nine 
hours, had been observed with animation. I began to 
philosophize, for a hundred passengers were drinking 
Rhenish wine from these very vineyards. I wondered 
if our civilization was very far superior to that of 
seven centuries ago. The castles are in ruins, but the 
mountain sides are clothed with vines, the product of 
which destroys the peace and puts out the light in ten 
thousand homes. 

One of these old castles is owned by an American, 
and as we came opposite to it, we felt a thrill of 
patriotism, for from the turret floated the American 
flag. " The stars and stripes !" cried someone in a fit 
of enthusiasm, and then several hundred Americans 
sent up a cheer, that told of devotion to a land that 
was as dear to us as " Fatherland v could possibly be 
to the Germans. 

The channel at Bingen is so nearly obstructed by 
rocks, that it requires skillful piloting to get through, 
and the attempt is never made in foggy weather. But 
the town of Bingen called up the sweet little poem of 

5 



66 WANDERINGS IN EUROPE. 

Caroline Norton, " Bingen on the Rhine," where the 
dying soldier in Algiers tells his comrade of his birth- 
place and mother and sister, and of " another — not a 
sister, 5 ' whom he had known in the happy days gone 

by- 

"I saw the blue Rhine sweep along — I heard, or 

seemed to hear, 
The German songs we used to sing, in chorus 

sweet and clear, 
And down the pleasant river, and up the slanting 

hill, 
The echoing chorus sounded through the evening 

calm and still; 
And her glad blue eyes were on me, as we passed 

with friendly talk 
Down many a path beloved of yore, and well- 
remembered walk, 
And her little hand lay lightly, confidingly in mine; 
But we'll meet no more at Bingen — loved Bingen 

on the Rhine." 




CHAPTER VI. 

E arrived at Mayence too late for the train 
to Heidelberg, and concluded to remain 
over Sabbath. There was no English 
services of any sort, and so we quietly 
rested at our hotel. We are really in a forti- 
fied city. A great fortress is above us, and 
every hill is fortified. Twelve thousand soldiers are 
out maneuvering, and parading the streets. For 
every soldier in the army, there is at least one woman 
gathering in the harvest. Europe pays for her mili- 
tary glory. I was not sorry to see the rain come on in 
such quantity as to stop the meaningless parade. 
The servants ran into the room to see that the win- 
dows were closed. Yivid lightning flashed through 
the air, and the peals of thunder were enough to make 
one who believed that noise was dangerous, tremble. 
The doctor wanted to know whether this storm was 
more violent than others. Notwithstanding the vio- 
lence of the storm, I could not restrain some show 
of merriment when he asked about the " ditnner 

und hlitzP The words seemed, however, far more 

(67) 



68 WANDERINGS IN EUROPE. 

expressive than our common thunder and lightning. 
But the quality of the German thunder and lightning 
demanded stronger words than we usually employ in 
this country. Some people think that they have fallen 
in hard lines when they must go to church. I con- 
fess that the hardest part of my experience was, that 
I could not go to church. Possibly, if I had the oppor- 
tunity, I might not prize it so highly. 

There were two things in Heidelberg to attract us 
thither — the castle and the university. The former 
fully came up to our expectations. Heidelberg is an 
important point, on account of its position, being situ- 
ated at the junction of the Neckar with the Rhine. 

The city, of about fifteen thousand, lies in the 
valley at the foot of the Konigstuhl, on the one 
side, and of the Heiligenberg, on the other. The 
mountain on which the castle is situated may be 
ascended either by a cog-wheel railroad or by car- 
riages. We went by the inclined road to the top of 
the mountain, and as we went up, speculated on the 
possibility of a rapid descent. The view from the sum- 
mit is exceptionally fine. Beneath you, lies the city, 
appearing very little (as most things and people 
do), when looked down on. The valleys of the Rhine 
and Neckar, with the now distant vine-clad mountains, 
are seen at a single glance, but give you life-long and 
pleasing remembrances. The usual beer garden is on 



HEIDELBERG CASTLE. 69 

the summit, and two hundred visitors were seated 
among the trees, looking down on the city, that nestles 
about the base of the mountain. Half way down the 
mountain, are the ruins of the castle, which are the 
most extensive to be seen in Europe. The structure 
has had a remarkable history. It was begun in the 
thirteenth century, and for two hundred years the 
work of extending and strengthening it went on. It 
was, however, blown up by the French in 1689, 
wholly dismantled in 1693, and, as if to complete its 
ruin, was struck by lightning in 1764. But, notwith- 
standing all these things, its ruins are on a scale that is 
simply magnificent. In a state of comparative preser- 
vation, you may see relics of the work of old masters, 
specimens of sculpture, in bas-reliefs and statues, 
approaching the perfect, and these, on walls that seem 
ready to fall. The guide whom we employed was an 
intelligent man, but full of hatred to the French. He 
took delight in expatiating on the vandalism of an 
army, that had no reverence for works of art. I 
pointed out the dark, cruel dungeons of the castle, and 
asked him what he thought of a people that would shut 
human beings in such places as these. 

As we returned to the city, we met some forty of 
the students of the university. I can have some little 
respect for the Indians, who disfigure and deform 
their bodies, for they are savages; but for these young 



70 WANDERINGS IN EUROPE. 

men, who glory in their scars, gotten in duels, I have 
nothing but pity and contempt. The duel has become 
an established thing now at Heidelberg. The young 
man who enters one of the fraternities, is expected to 
fight with some student of the other fraternity, and 
the one who gets the ugliest scars, is the hero of the 
school. We had an opportunity to witness two of 
these silly combats, falsely called duels, but declined. 
One of our companions waited to see the fight, and to 
him I am indebted for a full description. The young 
men have their throats guarded, so that they may escape 
death. They stand close together, so that they can 
not cut each other with the points of their swords. 
Two seconds rest on their knees between them, and 
with swords, guard the throats of the principals, who 
cut and slash, with but little skill, at each other's brows 
and cheeks. A surgeon stands by, and every few min- 
utes the fight is stopped, that he may examine the cuts, 
to see whether they are sufficiently deep to make ugly 
scars. Meantime, the fighters wipe the blood from 
their swords, and if the surgeon is not satisfied that 
they will appear sufficiently disfigured, he orders them 
to fight again. When it is over, the young man with 
his scarred face, receives an ovation from his friends, 
and is ever afterward proud of the number of scars 
he bears. It seems incredible to us, that this should 
be so ; but some of the men we saw, had on their brows 



DISHONORABLE SCARS. 71 

and cheeks, as many as twenty scars, that showed but 
little care for neat healing. The elegant apparel worn 
by these students, only sets off, in a more repulsive 
light, the ugliness of their faces. Such is the boasted 
civilization of the great university of Germany. In 
all my life I have seen nothing so repulsive. If they 
had fought to kill, it could not have been worse. As 
it is, the university duelist is as cowardly as he is 
brutal. Scars gotten in defense of the truth, are not 
dishonorable. The patriot may bear them as a dis- 
tinction of true worth. But a scar that is gotten in 
such a silly and disgusting manner, would be, in 
America, a badge of dishonor, to be carried about with 
shame and humility. If some enterprising German 
were to bring a couple of dozen of these students to 
our country for exhibition, they would awaken as 
much curiosity as the " Wild West Show " does in 
London or Paris. The facts given, appear all the 
more incredible, because of the gentlemanly bearing 
of the young men. 

The great tun is in the vaults of the castle. It dis- 
counts all the beer kegs that have ever been made. It 
was constructed in the vaults, and has never been 
moved from its position. As it lies on its side it 
measures thirty-two feet in length, and twenty-six 
feet in height. It has a capacity of 50,000 gallons. 
It has been filled and emptied three times. If some 



72 WANDERINGS IN EUROPE. 

old toper had been drinking from it, it would make 
him thirsty to look at ordinary whisky barrels after- 
ward. Some idiot conceived the idea of building a* 
platform on it for a dancing hall. It is just the size 
of a section, taken through the center of the tun, and 
is therefore twenty-six by thirty-two feet. A rough 
stairway leads up to this platform, and everything 
about the tun and the vaults is as rough as the stairs. 
From Heidelberg to Munich is a trip of which I 
can write but little, as we made it by night. One 
finds quite as much comfort, and far less expense, 
traveling in Europe, on a second, or even third-class 
ticket, than on a first. Sleeping cars are but little 
used, especially in the British Isles, where the dis- 
tance to be traveled is short. But we wanted to go 
to Munich by a sleeper. It was nearly train time, and 
we had no sleeping-car ticket. So we walked along 
the platform saying, "schlafen zug! " to every railroad 
guard or other official we met. JSTo one heeded our 
cry, but we knew that we were right, so we kept on, 
the doctor walking on one side of the platform and I 
on the other, and each one of us saying, eagerly, 
" Mtinchen schlafen zug ! " At last we found a guard, 
or conductor, who opened a door, and bade us enter. 
We were prisoners, securely locked within a finely 
upholstered compartment. No porter came to the 
door, when we wanted to retire, to make up our 



THE "SCHLAFEN ZUG." 73 

berths. To all appearance we were only in a well- 
gotten-up clay car, with a wash-room attached. The 
doctor insisted that, somehow or other, it must be a 
sleeping car, for both of us had asked for a " schlafen 
zug." He is a curious sort of fellow, and began at 
last, like a spoiled child, to pull at all the straps and 
buttons about the car. I assured him that it was a 
sleeper, but that the Germans sat up while they slept. 
I had often seen others do this. " You mean at our 
church," the doctor said. There was somewhat of 
malice in the speech, and I thought he might go on 
and wear himself out strap-pulling. It would make 
him more reasonable. After some ten minutes of 
diligent work, he pulled the right strap, and out shot 
the seat, and down came the back, and up sprang a 
pillow. A similar pull at a strap on the other side of 
the compartment was made, and a splendid bed, for 
one person, was ready for occupancy. I looked out of 
the window, while my companion stretched himself 
out on the soft bed, saying, with an air of triumph, 
"I told you!" "It took you a long time to find it 
out. Why didn't you ask me about it, and save all 
your trouble?" But I soon followed his example, 
and we, like two innocent children, fell asleep, locked 
in our compartment, and dreamed of friends thou- 
sands of miles away. How long our slumbers lasted 
I could not tell; but as the day began to break, the 



74 WANDERINGS IN EUROPE. 

conductor opened the door, and demanded our tickets. 
He then held the door open, and seemed to want 
something else, but to be too modest to ask for it. 
Supposing it to be money, but not knowing whether 
he wanted forty francs for the car, or a milder tip for 
himself, I gave him a large tip, amounting to five 
francs. He opened his eyes and shut the door. I 
am afraid that he did not give the railroad a com- 
mission out of his gratuity. We saw no one else to 
give money to, and quietly slept until time for prep- 
arations for leaving the train. It was quite amusing 
to see the doctor washing his hands and face in a 
sleeper in which there were no towels. He got along 
very well with the matter until he came to dry his 
face without a towel. It reminded me of a bird shak- 
ing its wings after the morning's ablution. Arrived 
at the station, we were courteously invited to get out. 
We obeyed. The night's rest had cost us half a 
dollar each, and we could not find anyone willing to 
take the remaining francs. But I presume, that had 
it not been for the doctor's persistence, in investi- 
gating, we would both have sat up till morning, and 
voted the " schlafen zug " a failure. 

The royal palace at Munich surprised us by its 
grandeur. We were conducted through halls, cham- 
bers, reception-rooms, state-rooms, and galleries, where 
splendid paintings, in frames of gorgeous patterns, 



HANDSOME LADIES. 75 

seemed to strive in rivalry with tapestries and inlaid 
furniture, most richly carved. Mosaics, so delicate in 
their construction that you had to inspect them closely 
to confirm your faith that they were what they pur- 
ported to be. A few of the names given to the differ- 
ent rooms of the palace are suggestive, as the ball- 6 
room, the card-rooms, the Battle Salon, the Hall of 
Charlemagne, the Barbarossa Hall, the Hapsburg 
Saloon, and the Throne Room. The guard, who con- 
ducted us through the palace, spoke only in German. 
It would be an insult to explain the garnishing of the 
palace and its furnishing in any tongue, save Ger- 
man. Yet, his articulation was very distinct, and he 
spoke slowly and in a sort of reverential tone, not 
unlike what some people employ when leading in 
formal prayers. He wanted to linger in the hall 
where are the portraits of thirty-six beautiful women. 
They must have been pretty, or they surely would 
not have been thus distinguished; but I failed to 
see the exceediug comeliness of form and feature 
that entitled them to be thus singled out from 
among their sisters. You can find thirty-six hand- 
somer ladies in any good-sized college town, who 
have not stood before the marriage altar, and are, 
like Queen Elizabeth, " In maiden meditation, fancy 
free." But the proper thing to do is, go along with 
the crowd and look appreciatively, and listen carefully, 



76 WANDERINGS IN EUROPE. 

no matter whether you comprehend what is said or 
not. 

When we arrived at the Old Pinakothek or Gallery of 
Ancient Masters, we found it closed; but a few gentle 
raps at the door brought the keeper, who assured us 
that it was not possible for us to be admitted. We 
gave the venerable lady a little silver for treating us 
so kindly, and she held out her hand for more. We 
gave it. Then she opened the door and turned us 
loose at pleasure to revel among the works of the old 
artists. It was the most enjoyable visit we could have 
made. We were alone in the presence of some of the 
masters of the world. They spoke to us through the 
conception of their brains and the skill of their hands. 
It is impossible even to glance at the nearly two thou- 
sand paintings opened to you. Holbein and Diirer, 
Van Dyck and Rubens, Perugino and Correggio, Titian 
and Raphael, Tintoretto and Paul Veronese, had each 
worked for us, and we were alone in the presence of 
their best work. No footfall disturbed us; no whis- 
perings of visitors; no dull explanations of guides, who 
have learned their lessons like parrots. 

But at last we came to an artist; a genuine living 
artist, who had permission to perfect his work in the 
gallery. He was an old man, sitting before an easel 
on which was a half -finished painting of Abraham and 
Hagar. He was copying the painting by del Sarto. 



A TRUE ARTIST. 77 

The old artist's face was a study. 1 stopped to read 
his expression. He had evidently been dissatisfied 
with his work, and looked with delight and perplexity 
at the masterpiece. How could he ever get such col- 
oring as distinguished the work of this renowned one 
of the Florentine school? He did not turn his head 
or avert his eyes one moment from his study. I 
walked out softly, not wishing to disturb him. It 
would be interesting to give the biography of an artist 
whose work, now nearly four hundred years old, has 
such power over the soul that the hours go by unno- 
ticed by a devotee who can spend days in solitude, 
seeking to copy a single painting. He was a child of 
Florence, was married to a woman utterly unworthy 
of him, but for whom he always manifested the fondest 
attachment. His friends were astonished that her 
features were always prominent in the portraits of 
some of his most exalted characters. Did the artist's 
clear eye see beauty where others saw nothing but 
deformity ? Is the critic correct who said : " He would 
have been a better artist if he had been more suit- 
ably married?" 

The " Bavaria," a colossal monument, a short dis- 
tance from the city, is esteemed by many an object 
of great interest. It is sixty-nine feet high, and there 
is a spiral stairway inside, which permits easy ascent, 
and through openings in the head, you can get a fine 



78 WANDERINGS IN EUROPE. 

view. This is what we are taught in guide-books. I 
could not see the propriety of crawling up a stairway, 
through the chest and neck of the statue, in order to 
look out through little peep-holes, when you could 
stand outside, and see far more distinctly. But then 
there is a fee, a very small one, that is exacted of you 
for the privilege of going in to look out, and the easily 
gulled tourist thinks, of course, that a fee would not 
be charged, unless there was something to gain by its 
payment. 

As we go south, the railway accommodations become 
better, or else we become accustomed to European 
fogyism. A hundred amusing things occur, and some- 
times the joke comes too near home to be altogether 
pleasant. One's enjoyment of a joke depends very 
much on the person who is the chief sufferer from it. 
One day I went out hastily to have our luggage 
examined at the custom-house. I left my hat in the 
rack, wearing my traveling cap. After the fifteen 
minutes' worry of persuading the stupid officials that 
I had no dynamite with me, I was ushered into another 
compartment, and in fact into another train. I knew 
we were to change cars here, but had forgotten about 
my hat. On entering, I happened to put my hand to my 
head. The people in the compartment could not under- 
stand English, but they readily took in the situation; for 
one's annoyance at finding that he must travel without a 



SYMPATHY WASTED. 79 

hat, needs no interpreter to make plain. Of course, I 
blamed the doctor for not attending to my hat. He 
seemed glad that he had not allowed me to leave my 
coat and shoes. An Italian lady who sat opposite me, 
said something to her companion, and they both 
laughr d, and then looked on me with a sort of pity- 
ing smile. I did not need an interpreter. I can 
endure ridicule, because of my mishaps, but smiling 
sympathy is too much for me. I was a foreigner, and 
even in America, enjoy jokes on someone else much 
better than on myself. The lady was elegantly dressed, 
and evidently belonged to the better class. If she had 
laughed outright and coarsely, I would have said that 
she was vulgar, and paid no more attention to it; but 
every time I put up my hand to my head, the lady 
looked out of the window, to hide her ridicule. That 
annoyed me still more. She was refined. 

I recalled a little incident in Chicago, where a lady 
whose children did not care to be left in charge of 
the servant, got into a worse predicament. She had 
sent one of her servants out of the room with her 
children while she put on her hat and cloak, intend- 
ing to avoid a scene with her little boys. She had 
just fastened on a face veil, when she heard the chil- 
dren coming back. She hastily left the house with- 
out ever thinking of her hat, and wearing the little 
veil, that stood up about her head like a crown. 



80 WANDERINGS IN EUROPE. 

Imagine, if you can, a lady elegantly attired, with 
a face veil, the rough upper edge of which is not 
covered by a hat. She walked to the street car, and 
entered it, for her trip down town, a distance of some 
three miles. People in the car seemed to be in an 
unusually good humor that morning. Everyone that 
came in, no matter how demure he was on entering, 
looked at her and was pleased. It was delightful to 
have this happy power of making others happy. At 
last a bright little woman looked at her, moved up 
beside her, and said, " Madam, pardon me. But 
really, you have forgotten to put on your hat !" The 
lady raised her hand, and then all the people in the 
car laughed aloud. What did she do ? Get flurried 
and start back home ? Not at all. She kept her seat, 
and when she got down town, walked into a store and 
borrowed a hat, and finished her shopping. I thought 
of her, and bided my time. Revenge came quickly, 
and terribly. There sat next to my tormentor, an old 
German lady, who carried a sort of catch-all, the mouth 
of which was opened, because the bag was too short to 
take in the whole length of a beer bottle which she 
carried. The motion of the car stirred up the nasty 
fluid, and as the cork went whizzing across the com- 
partment, the beer sputtered out of the bottle on the 
frock, which was a delicate dove-color, or moonlight 
on the lake, or ashes of roses — I am unable to tell just 



DID NOT GET HIS DESERTS. 81 

what. I did not laugh. I said nothing. I was too 
deeply filled with regret to laugh — regret that the 
doctor had not been sitting beside her to have shared 
her fate. He enjoyed all, but suffered nothing. At 
the next stop, I sprang out of the train, and gave a few 
pfennigs to a man who pointed out another man, who 
also took a few more pfennigs, who showed me 
another man, carrying my hat, who handed it to me 
with a smile, caused by the pfennigs which I gave 
him. I returned in triumph, wearing my hat, while 
the lady sat with her stained dress, looking entirely 
subdued, and the doctor refused to recognize my good 
fortune, but seemed absorbed in the contents of a Ger- 
man paper, which he had bought in my absence. 
Some people in this life seem to be favored by escap- 
ing the misfortunes of their neighbors, even when 
they deserve punishment. 



6 




CHAPTER VII. 

E are nearing Venice. Who has not read 

of it ? Who has not heard of the canals 

and gondolas and Eialto and Bridge of 

Sighs and palaces ? I had dreamed of 

Venice, but scarcely dared entertain a hope 

of ever seeing it. Will I be disappointed ? As 

we approach the city we look from both sides of 

the car, and the waters of the Adriatic are about us. 

For miles we are running over the sea. I remember 

the description. " Venice is built on seventy-two 

little islands in the great lagoon that is thirty miles 

long and five miles broad." It is raining, and the 

smooth waters about us are all dimpled, as it were, with 

smiles to greet us. We have reached the station. The 

porter of the Grand Hotel takes our luggage. I wished 

that we were some place else, where we could get a 

carriage, for there are no hacks here, and no horses, 

and to ride in a gondola in such a storm would not be 

pleasant. A gondola is called, and in a minute we 

are in a little compartment, the windows of which 

we draw to, and care not a farthing now where we are 

(82) 



BARBER POLES. 83 

taken, and just as little whether it rains or shines. 
The gondolier pushes away from the steps, and glides 
past a score of other gondolas. He has received his 
directions from the hotel porter. We see but little of 
the city from our narrow coop. The rain increases, 
and the great drops of hail rattle against the windows. 
We are indifferent to hail and rain alike. 

The poles in front of hotels and houses perplex us. 
We knew, of course, that there had to be something 
there with which to fasten the gondolas, but why 
should there be half a dozen in front of one house? 
Some, standing up out of the water, look for all the 
world like barber poles. They are striped, red and 
white, I told my friend that these striped poles 
showed a barber shop near by. He wanted to know 
why they needed eight poles for a single shop. Some 
people are unreasonable. They always make objec- 
tions when you talk knowingly. The eight poles are 
simply a big sign. Some advertisers use an inch, 
others a column, and still others an entire page. Thn 
fellow is a big advertiser. He makes a display. At 
last we found out that these extra poles were used to 
keep the gondolas from floating out, crosswise, in the 
canal. The doctor was triumphant, and intimated that 
some people get age without getting wisdom. He 
could not mean me, for I was learning rapidly. So I 
said it was too true, and they were to be pitied, but I 



84 WANDERINGS IN EUROPE. 

would continue teaching him, so that he need not fear 
it — for himself— and if there was anything else he 
did not understand, I would not think it any trouble 
to explain it to him. He looked at me in astonish- 
ment, but made no reply. After dinner, I w T alked out 
on the piazza, which is skirted by the waters, of the 
Grand Canal. A gentleman, who spoke fairly good 
English, came to me, hurriedly, and said: 

"Ah, Signor, do you know him? I thought you 
were a stranger; but I see you looking at him. 5 ' 

" I am looking at that splendid dog, standing on 
the front ot the gondola." 

"But, Signor/' he continued, "the man in the 
gondola is Don Carlos, of Spain." 

I did not want to show too much surprise, and so 
said: 

" What a beautiful dog ! He stands there as grace- 
fully as if he were manning the gondola, and he has 
Don Carlos in the boat with him ! The aspirant to 
the throne ought to be proud of such a dog ! " 

But, seriously, I doubted whether the dog, if he 
could reason, would be proud of his master. 

You can go anywhere in Yenice by little narrow 
alleys, called streets. On these the shops are situated, 
and from them bridges reach across the canals. These 
streets are tortuous and very narrow. You never see 
a horse or carriage in the city. If you will picture to 



" VILLAGE— VILLAS 85 

yourself a city where the main streets are water and 
the alleys are dry land, and bridges across the main 
streets, so as to connect the alleys, you have a fair 
idea of the streets and canals of Venice. The great 
thoroughfare is the Grand Canal. It is in the shape 
of a letter S, and divides the city into nearly equal 
parts. There are one hundred and forty-seven small 
canals, spanned by about four hundred bridges. Our 
first trip was by the rear of the hotel, in a way so 
narrow that, in places, you could easily touch both 
walls at the same time, by extending your arms. The 
street itself which was filled with shops of different 
kinds, was not more than twelve feet wide. 

We were anxious to hear from home, and so sought 
out the telegraph office. A friend had prepared a full 
code for us, so that by the use of a single word, we 
could ask or receive the answer to a question. You 
find, when cabling, that every word you use, including 
your name and address, and the name and address of 
the party to whom you telegraph, is charged for; 
hence the use of a code, where one word may mean 
very much. The message we sent was simply: 

Patten, Chicago: 

Village. 

We did not sign our names to it, and gave no 
address in the city. The only thing the company does 
for nothing is, give the name of the city from which 



86 WANDERINGS IN EUROPE. 

you send the message, and this they have to do for their 
own protection. The interpretation of our message was : 
J. A. Patten, Chicago, Illinois, U. S. A. 
Please cable us here at once, whether our families are well. 

C G. Davis. 
W. T. Meloy. 

It was six o'clock in the evening, and we knew that 

it was early in the afternoon at home, and that the 

message would be received before our Chicago friend 

left his office. Next morning we had the reply: 

Meloy, Venice: 

Villa. 

Which meant, with our full address, and the name 
of our friend. 

Both your families are well. 

Cyrus Field is dead, but I thanked G-od, for the first 
time in my life, that he once lived. How ungrateful 
we are ! How near he brings us to our homes and 
loved ones ! Italy is almost in speaking distance of 
Chicago. 

The next place to visit is St. Mark's Square, which 
is simply a large open court, in front of St. Mark's 
Church. This church is joined to the Palace of the 
Doges. On the other sides, there are stores and shops 
and restaurants. All sorts of goods are sold here, the 
shop-keepers being skilled in remembering the cus- 
tomers who have visited them in former times, and 



FEEDING THE PIGEONS. 87 

gratifying their vanity by either naming them or 
giving some circumstances connected with a former 
visit. Such a recognition generally insures a pur- 
chase. In the shops we find Venetian glass, lace, 
carved wood, pictures, statuary, and jewelry. These 
are displayed in an artistic manner, and, while beauti- 
ful in themselves, appear doubly so as seen in Vene- 
tian settings. In the day-time thousands of pigeons 
gather in the square to be fed. Strangers buy little 
packages of corn, and the birds flock to the opened hand, 
tumbling over each other, on the palm and wrist of 
the one who feeds them, in their eagerness. Kindness, 
like love, casts out fear from the hearts, both of pigeons 
and men. 

The Cathedral of St. Mark dates back to the tenth 
century, and is unlike any other cathedral in Europe. 
This may, in part, be accounted for by the fact that 
every vessel that came from the East, to Venice, was 
required to bring something for the church. There 
must have been a rivalry to secure the finest pillars 
and the richest pieces of marble. There are, in the 
front of the structure, five hundred columns, differing 
in size and shape and color. Within, are the pillars of 
solid alabaster, that appear to be over twelve inches 
in diameter, through which the light of a little taper 
may be seen more clearly than had the pillars been 
of glass. The first objects to which attention is 



88 WANDERINGS IN EUROPE. 

invited, are the bronze horses, brought from Constanti- 
nople in the times of the crusades. They are not so 
wonderfully impressive that attention would be given 
them, were it not for their historic associations. 
Napoleon carried them away to Paris, but they were 
restored to Venice again in 1815, and it is probable 
that they will always remain here. 

The ducal palace, ordinarily called the Doge's Pal- 
ace, is an object of great interest. The name, doge, 
seems to be from the Latin dux — a leader. The name 
of the Kialto, so often used in all the world, was 
originally the name of one of the islands on which 
the city is built — the Island of Rivo Alto, the deep 
stream. There is a silly story, generally believed, that 
the Pope was so grateful to the Doge Ziani for with- 
drawing from a league against Barbarossa, that he 
gave him a ring, and joined the sea as a dutiful bride 
to Venice. The sea was ever afterward to be subject 
to the authority of her husband. But, somehow, 
things got reversed in the popular mind, and Venice 
has been called, not the husband, but the bride of the 
sea. It may be that the question of the rights of the 
bride became involved, and peace was gained, as in 
some other things, by a simple change of authority. 

The Hall of the Great Council is one of the finest 
in Europe. It is one hundred and seventy-five feet 
long, eighty-five feet wide, and fifty-one feet high. 



SPAZIO. 89 

On the entrance wall is a picture of Paradise, by 
Tintoretto, which is the largest oil-painting in the 
world. It is eighty-four feet long, and thirty-four feet 
wide. Such a work would have been enough for an 
ordinary life-time, yet it is only one of hundreds that 
bear the artist's name. In this hall are the portraits 
of seventy-six doges. There is one space left vacant. 
It was made for the portrait of Marino Falieri, the 
fifty-sixth Doge The space is painted black, and on 
it are the words, easily translated, because of their 
resemblance to the English, Spazio di Marino Falieri, 
decajpito. There is something about this story, more 
than five centuries old, that awakens, even now, in our 
minds, strange feelings of interest. The Doge had 
been, before his appointment to office, singularly suc- 
cessful in maintaining the honor of Venice, both as 
statesman and warrior. When eighty years old, he 
was called on to accept the governorship of Venice. 
Adverse fortune overtook the fleets of the brave peo- 
ple. But, with consummate skill, he made honorable 
treaties, and his reign gave promise of a close in peace. 
The Doge gave a great feast in the palace, which was 
the more enjoyed because of the successful terms of a 
truce established with Genoa. A young man, Michael 
Steno, insulted, at this revel, one of the maids of 
honor, which so offended the Doge that he ordered the 
youth to quit the palace. The young and unprincipled 



90 WANDERINGS IN E UROPE. 

Steno sought revenge by writing a mean charge 
on the Doge's chair, against the wife of the Doge him- 
self. Steno was tried, and the severity that prevailed 
then seemed, for some reason, to have been relaxed, 
and he received a few weeks of imprisonment and but 
one year's exile. This so outraged the haughty old 
Doge that he madly determined to wreak summary 
vengeance on all the nobility of Venice. He knew 
that in their slaughter he would have the sympathy of 
the people, for the nobility were hated as tyrants. 
But, before the time fixed for executing his purpose, 
the plot was discovered. He was arrested, and made 
full confession, The council ordered him to be be- 
headed. Under the great stairs of the palace, which 
we have looked on, the sentence was executed, and 
now the space, intended for his portrait, is blank. 

We must respect the Doge's great age and great 
services to the state. We must honor him for rebuk- 
ing the insult offered to a maid of honor. We praise 
his righteous indignation at the insult offered to his 
wife. We may even regard the sentence passed on 
the Venetian nobleman as wholly inadequate. But 
the great crime he contemplated was altogether un- 
justifiable. His sentence may have been just, but we 
can not look on the vacant space without feeling that 
justice is terrible, and experiencing a regret that the 
space should remain there to tell coming centuries a 



A MALEDICTION. 91 

story that otherwise might have been forgotten. The 
feeling is intensified when, some hours later, we stand 
in the dark, cold cell where the old man was confined. 
Lord Byron has written an historical tragedy, based 
on this sad history. He represents the Doge as an 
educated, patriotic ruler; yet rash and violent. He 
gathers the conspirators about him and denounces the 
gross insult offered to him. He denounces the forty 
for the mere semblance of punishment inflicted on 
one who had dared to insult the wife of the ruler. But 
at last, being condemned, he refuses to plead for 
mercy, and forgives his enemies, but defies the court 
that had condemned him. Then he begins an oration, 
that becomes more bitter as he proceeds to record the 
city's ingratitude, and turns, with a malediction on 
his lips, to the executioner, whom he thus addresses : 

" Slave to thine office ! 
Strike as I struck the foe ! Strike as I would 
Have struck those tyrants ! Strike deep as my curse ! 
Strike— and but once ! " 

We are getting away from those days of injustice 
and cruelty. Humanity turns not to the East for its 
wisdom and guidance, but he who reads the history 
of the race, and marks the signs of the times, must 
recognize that a fuller, clearer, sweeter light has 
dawned upon the world. The black veil, painted over 
the vacant place, may never be removed, and the 



92 WANDERINGS IN EUROPE. 

world may still hear the sad story of an old man's 
wrath and cruel death, but the head that fell was 
crowned only with that poor symbol of authority 
which a people can give and which they may take 
away again. The Jews cried out, centuries before this, 
" We have no king but Caesar ! " The nations of the 
earth will yet become republics, and, in the high 
freedom which enlightened and redeemed natures 
enjoy, will send back to the East a mighty shout, 
which all people shall hear, "We have no king but 
Jesus ! " And, in that reign, he who has served most 
will be most honored, and part of the honor will be 
greater ability for doing more, and fuller opportunity 
for service. I turn away from the pictures of the 
doges, and from the palaces, too, rejoicing that Amer- 
ica has no palaces, no titled nobility, no royal pension- 
ers, no untaxed lands, no kings, and no slaves ! 

We returned to the hotel, where we found many 
Americans at table. They greeted us as though we 
had always been friends. They all seemed happy, 
but one. She was a woman who had evidently been 
disappointed in life, and, as she was now past fifty, saw 
no opportunity to recover lost ground, so she gave 
herself up to criticism and wine. She saw no beauty 
in Venice ; flowers had no fragrance ; the skies were 
not bright, even in Italy, and there was nothing fair 
in all the world, and nothing good in any man, or in 



THE GONDOLIER. 93 

anything. I smiled, in approbation of her decision, 
when she said, that after all she had concluded to 
remain twelve months longer in Venice, for I was 
afraid she might visit Chicago. 

The sun was setting in a cloudless sky when we 
ordered a gondola to the steps. We are to see Venice 
by night, and that night a moonlight. The gondolier 
lighted his lamp and rowed his boat out on the Grand 
Canal. There seemed to be no twilight, for the moon 
began to silver over the waters as soon as we had seen 
the sun disappear. Here and there her beams were 
hidden by some palace, and when we were in the 
shadows the darkness was intense. The lights of a 
hundred lamps, shining from as many gondolas, 
seemed unreal, in their weird beauty. We heard the 
strange calls of the gondolier, as he indicated his 
course or directed his fellows on their way. His 
shadow, with the long oar in his hand, was projected 
at great length on the waters. He takes a short, noise- 
less dip of the oar, and balancing himself and guid- 
ing his boat at the same time, seems to know where 
to hesitate and where to speed you on. The merry 
voices of pleasure-seekers, as they flit by, tell you of 
different nationalities seeking to gain favor from the 
same shy goddess — Pleasure. It is easy to distinguish 
the German, French, and Italian. Now we meet a 
gondola containing six persons, who have no secrets 



94 WANDERINGS IN EUROPE. 

to keep, and again only two, who whisper words of 
love, from trembling lips, that can only be under- 
stood as the heart becomes interpreter. They have 
instructed their gondolier to go very softly through 
the shadows, or does the wise Venetian know to 
linger there without directions? We hear the sweet 
voices of the natives, who have trained themselves 
to catch liras from strangers, as they sing their lyrics. 
We glide by old palaces of wealth and refinement 
and by simpler homes, where, on the balconies over 
the canal, friends are talking with each other. We 
pass by the same houses of which Shakespeare wrote. 
The gondolier, bending forward, attempts to tell us 
in English, the names of palaces and the bridges that 
span the smaller canals. Under the Kialto, and then 
by tortuous ways, by many a turn in narrower waters, 
calls out, at length, " Ponte de' Sospiri" It would 
have been irreverent to have said " the Bridge of 
Sighs." But we would have known it had he not 
given it a name. Here is the structure over which, 
from the palace to the prison, so many sad hearts have 
gone. The bridge is much higher than the others, 
and never was used for a general thoroughfare, for the 
sufficient reason that to enter it one must have fir c t 
been in the prison or the palace. There is a popular 
error that this bridge led to the old dungeons. The 



CHARMING WITH LACE. 95 

old dungeons are under the palace, and before the 
year 1620 prisoners were confined in them. 

It was nine o'clock in the evening, and we ordered 
our gondolier, with a single word, to take us to St. 
Marks. All Venice seemed to be there; America, 
England, France, and Germany were there. A band 
was discoursing sweet music in the center of the 
square. A thousand men and women were prom- 
enading, chatting eagerly, or listening to the music. 
The cares of the home and the shop were left behind 
by these. The irritations of the day were forgotten, 
and the quarrels of friends and lovers were easily ad- 
justed in the midst of this gaiety. Two thousand were 
filling the shops or sitting at tables, eating and drink- 
ing. A beer, that must have been light, from the vast 
mugs in which it was served, was the favorite beverage. 
Many, however, contented themselves with mineral 
waters and lemonades. There was no loud talking, 
and no boisterous behavior. Beautiful ladies, who 
knew how to add to their charms by the skillful 
adjustment of the laces thrown over their heads, 
enjoyed the rest, and as they emptied their goblets, 
had an opportunity of studying the characters and 
habits of wanderers from over the world. The story 
of the beauty of refined Italian ladies is not over- 
drawn ; but there is a lack of that sprightliness and 



96 WANDERINGS IN EUROPE. 

intelligence that distinguish women in the British 
Isles and in America. 

After a few hours we returned to our hotel, and 
sought sleep. The little child, unused to scenes of 
gaiety, sometimes banishes the angel that soothes it to 
rest. It was so with me. I lived the evening over 
again many times before I closed my eyes, and then 
would waken from the dream of the gently dipping 
oar and flickering light that turned the waters into 
brightness and beauty, and of sweet strains of music 
and shadowy forms of graceful men, bending to the 
oar. I heard again the gondolier's call, as in the 
darkness he turned about the corners of a palace. I 
slept, dreamed, and awoke again. Then I rubbed my 
eyes, and muttered, " Beautiful Venice! Seen by 
night, with her heart bent on pleasure ! Can the 
dream be repeated by day, or will the light cause the 
picture to fade away ? There are nobler objects in 
life than mere pleasure, I have drawn the picture by 
artificial light, and if the sun destroy it r I shall experi- 
ence a disappointment." 

I found in a paper, published in the West, an 
account of our night in Venice, from the pen of my 
companion, Doctor Davis. The reader, I know, will 
thank me for giving his impressions, in his own well- 
dressed sentences. 



DOCTOR DAVIS IN VENICE. 97 

ONE NIGHT IN VENICE. 

Ah, classic Yenice ! We dreamed of it in our boy- 
hood days. We saw it in our imagination, and linked 
it with the romances of our earlier years. We are 
met at the station by the porter of our hotel. He 
conducts us through the throng of people. What a 
babel of tongues! Italian, French, German, and 
English voices are heard mingling with the stranger 
tones coming from the distant Orient. We go through 
a labyrinth of passages to a landing, with steps of 
stone leading down to the water's edge. On looking 
up, we see a broad street, but it is water, and the houses 
rise high on either side, showing marks made from the 
rising and falling of the tide. Just at the water's 
edge are a number of strange-looking boats, about 
thirty feet long, tapering at each end and rising in 
front to an ornamented crest, not unlike the curve of 
a swan's neck. Most of them have a little canopy in 
the center, large enough to protect two people. On 
the rear of each stands a man shouting for customers. 
Ah, we understand now ; these are gondoliers with 
their gondolas, waiting to take us to our respective 
hotels. They are the cabmen of Venice. It is raining 
and hailing. We draw down the glass sides of our 
canopy, and are safe from the storm. Soon we are 
gliding down the Grand Canal. The gondolier has but 
one oar, and yet he steers the gondola with wonderful 



98 WANDERINGS IN EUROPE. 

precision. We glide in and out between many 
others on the canal, but there is no collision. We 
pass into a narrower channel, and under many bridges; 
these are the causeways that connect the narrow foot- 
streets in the rear of the canals. The clouds disap- 
pear, the sun shines, and now we are nearing a series 
of marble steps. The water splashes upon them, the 
gondola stops, and a courteous porter welcomes us to 
the Grand Hotel. We order dinner, repair to our 
rooms, improve our toilets, and entering the drawing- 
room find a number of pleasant Americans. We 
converse, and look out over the Adriatic Sea. 

But the shades of evening are coming on, the lights 
are appearing, and now is the hour when Venice, 
" Queen of the Sea," robes herself like a joyous bride. 
The sky is blue, the stars shine like jewels in the 
vault of heaven, and the moon, nearing the full, casts 
shadows of towering castles and spires, lighting up the 
ivied walls, and reflecting back, in a thousand waves 
of quivering light, the ripples of the Adriatic Sea. 
We again enter our gondola, and say to our gondolier, 
" the Grand Canal." We are soon gliding over the 
sparkling waters, from which a thousand lights and 
fantastic shapes are reflected. At each dip of the 
oar, the water falls like a myriad of pearls, dimpling 
on the surface, and the slight ripple is the only sound 
that breaks the quiet calm. But we are not alone. 



DOCTOR DAVIS IN VENICE. 99 

Soon, from every direction, come gondolas in swarms. 
Venice, now, is on pleasure bent. She has awakened 
from her sleep. Some of the mysterious barks con- 
tain one, two, three, or even six people. Some of the 
occupants are riding in meditative thought, some are 
full of the joy of life, and send their songs of plaintive 
melody out over the waters, and still others whisper 
their words so low and soft that we can only imagine 
a recital of the old, old story. On and on we go? 
passing at every turn, monuments of painting, romance, 
and art, the castles of the old nobility, gliding down 
narrow canals, then into wider ones, under bridges, 
under the famed Rialto, and, at the last, under the 
historic Bridge of Sighs, across which, in past cent- 
uries, hundreds, perhaps thousands, of human beings 
have walked to the dungeons beneath the Palace of the 
Doges. As we glide under this arch, and between the 
palace and the old prison, the stillness is oppressive, 
and the very air seems laden with mysterious whisper- 
ings of those w T ho, in these subterraneous cells, suffered 
agony and death. But ah, we are in the moonlight 
again, the air is full of soft strains of music, light, and 
life. Could it be possible for so much agony, pain, and 
death to have entered here ? 

We land, and approach the plaza of St. Mark's Church, 
Thousands are now coming here, to finish the night's 
revel. A band discourses music. We are again in the 



100 WANDERINGS IN EUROPE. 

babel of tongues. We hear, the same instant, German, 
French, English, and Italian spoken. Some prome- 
nade, while others sit and listen to the ebb and flow 
of melody, or converse in quiet tones. There is no 
noise, no boisterousness ; each individual seems tuned 
in harmony with the surroundings. It is nearing mid- 
night ; the crowd is gently dispersing ; we seek our 
hotel. The music is dying out, but still, at intervals, 
fronTthe Grand Canal, the palaces, and even far out on 
the Adriatic, some plaintive strain comes to mingle 
with our dreams. Yenice, like a beautiful, happy 
child, is sleeping, pillowed on the sea. 
August 5, 1892. 



And now, what more shall I say of Venice ? It 
would be pleasing to leave the reader with the de- 
lightful impression made on his mind by what has 
been given by my friend. Truthful words will surely 
offend. The lamps have gone out on the canals. 
Gondolas have lost a part of their charm. A smoking 
little steamer disturbs the waters of the Grand Canal. 
The bridges are old and ugly. The walls of the 
palaces are scaly, and remind me of potatoes with the 
skin all flecking off. The little narrow streets never 
see the sun, and are full of beggars. The city is old, 
grotesque, and without ambition. I experienced the 



VENICE BY DAY. 101 

little boy's disappointment, when, the morning after 
the circus, he goes to the grounds. The ruig is there, 
but the tinseled riders are nowhere to be found. He sees 
heaps of old straw, where the night before a princess 
was crowned. Venice by night is the rocket that 
sweeps gracefully through the heavens and bursts in 
a blaze of glory, and astonishes again and again, by 
fresh exhibitions of brilliancy. Venice by day is the 
stick that falls with a dull thud to the ground when 
the rocket has exploded. It is the ashes left when 
the candle has burned low in the socket. It is the toy 
balloon that delighted the child yesterday, but is 
found in the morning wilted up in some corner of the 
room. It is a golden chariot by night, but in the 
morning it is without comeliness. 

Yet I am glad that I saw Venice by night — by 
moonlight, for though, like the photographic proof, the 
sun may spoil it, yet I recall, with pleasure, the fair 
picture before the sun had touched it. Buy only colored 
pictures of Venice — moonlight scenes, if you can get 
them. The sun reveals the mold and scaling walls 
and poverty of a city that has no counterpart on earth. 
Yet, with it all, and after the lapse of a few months, 
the fair night scene grows brighter, and the reality 
of the day becomes less distinct. It is, however, in 
accordance with a higher law, that melodies are eter- 
nal, while discords are destroyed. One in love with 



102 WANDERINGS IN EUROPE. 

Venice will say of her, as the artist said of his wife, 
" Poverty can not hide her graces, for even in rags 
she would be nobler than a queen. 55 

The next morning we visited the dungeons under 
the palace. In the upper dungeons criminal prison- 
ers were kept. The walls were lined with wood, and 
the prisoner had a wooden slab on which to lie. He 
was generally allowed fifteen days after he was sen- 
tenced in which to prepare for death. The political 
prisoner was confined in a dungeon beneath the 
former. He was shut in by an iron door, and there 
was no wood whatever in his cell. His bed was a 
stone slab elevated a little above the floor. A few 
dim rays of light entered the cell, and the air was 
enough to make his imprisonment shorter than the 
time allotted him. He had but three days given him 
in which to prepare for judgment. In the gloomy 
hallway outside these cells, is a narrow stone on 
which thousands were beheaded. An opening in 
the floor near this stone allowed the blood of the 
slain to escape to the waters of the canal under the 
Bridge of Sighs. I began to deplore the cruelty of 
the doges, and did not see how such monsters could 
live in Venice. The guide responded, using three 
languages, and his words, as I interpreted them, were: 

w Ah, Signor, that was six hundred years ago. Italy 



CONVENIENT IGNORANCE. 103 

does not hang men up by the thumbs now, as was 
done in America last month." 

I found it convenient to resort to the usual trick of 
a servant we once had, who never understood English 
when told to do anything that she did not want to do. 
I failed to fully comprehend him. Yet, had I known 
all the circumstances, it would not have been hard to 
give an excuse for seeming cruelty. Severity is some- 
times mercy. It is difficult for us to judge of what 
is done four thousand miles away, or of what was 
done five hundred years ago. Were we nearer, either 
in time or distance, we might excuse, or even justify, 
what we are so ready to condemn. But how little 
the world is ! History gives us an ever present 
judgment-seat, from which we determine the quality 
of actions done in the remote past, and the telegraph 
enables the most distant nations to sit in judgment on 
the deeds of our yesterday. 




CHAPTER VIII. 

N the way to Milan, I jotted down the words: 

" Beautiful lakes, old forts, poor fields." 

The fact has been forcing itself on me 

ever since we crossed the North Sea, that 

Europe is impoverished by her standing armies. 

Almost every ridge has been fortified at a vast 

expenditure of labor and money* These fortifications, 

so useful a few years ago in military struggles, are 

to-day of little more value than the castles of feudal 

lords. Science has rendered these forts of no use 

whatever, unless it be to reveal what sacrifices men 

made to overcome their fellows, or to retain their soil. 

It seems almost a paradox, but it is true, that the more 

destructive the enginery of war may be, the more 

surely will it tend to peace. When the missile means 

death, men will hesitate long before they resort to 

its use. 

It is not alone the vast sum that is paid to equip and 

feed and pay an army, that drains away a nation's life. 

These things are not little in the scale. The loss to a 

country is incalculable when you draw away from its 

(104) 



TOO MANY SOLDIERS. 105 

producing force such armies as are maintained in 
Germany and France, and even in England. It 
retards the spread of general intelligence among the 
people, by lessening the number of the hands left to do 
the work of life. The children are neglected when 
the mother labors in the field. It is also to be noted 
that the army demands the strong and young and 
well-favored from among the people, and the drudgery 
of the camp gives but little time for study, and but 
little disposition for reflection. Work itself does not 
ennoble. It is enduring work that gives character to 
our toil. When the nations learn war no more, there 
will be possibilities for advancement that do not exist 
to-day. Time wasted, energies misdirected, treasures 
unprofitably employed, are the sure precursors of 
poverty and discontentment. 

We come nearer the Alps, and as the evening 
approaches the mountains gaze on us with frowning 
brows. There were two things in Milan that caused us 
to visit it. The first, of course, was the cathedral, and 
the second a painting on the walls of a dingy little 
chapel. The cathedral, which has been the wonder of 
the world, we first saw by electric light. Having 
read so many descriptions of it, I felt a peculiar thrill 
of satisfaction, when, from my room, I looked out on the 
brilliantly lighted streets, and across the square, in 
plain view of my window, was the cathedral of Milan. 



106 WANDERINGS IN EUROPE. 

I had read in books that it has ninety-eight turrets, 
two thousand statues, and that the roof is supported 
by fifty-two columns, from eight to twelve feet in 
thickness, and that it has been in process of erection 
for more than five hundred years. It was a favorable 
time to see the great building, and in the bright lights 
its many minarets shone and glistened as if the pure 
white marble had been finely polished. But the first 
feeling I had was one of disappointment. Something 
impressed me unfavorably about it. You have a friend 
who never can be comfortable when in your presence, 
if there is anything wrong with your attire. He is 
restless if he sees a dent in your hat. He can hardly 
contain himself if your vest collar shows the sixteenth 
part of an inch above your coat. He gets fidgety if 
your neck-tie threatens to become unfastened. He 
wants to straighten you out just now and here, before 
he can enjoy life. Some such feeling took possession 
of me as I leaned on the window-sill and looked at the 
cathedral. But as it took five hundred years to build 
it, I had serious doubts whether, in the years allotted 
to me, I could have its proportions corrected. The 
building does not appear high enough for its width, 
and notwithstanding the fact that the top of the statue 
of the Madonna is three hundred and fifty-five feet 
above the pavement, the building looks too low. This 
may be caused by the unusual width of the cathedral 



CATHEDRAL OF MILAN. 107 

(two hundred and eighty-seven feet), and also because 
the pinnacles in front hide the steeple in the center. 
As we walked about it by moonlight, and took in its 
vastness, this feeling was to some extent modified, but 
not entirely removed, and subsequent reflections 
deepen the impression first made. The floor is in 
mosaic of red, white, and blue marble. The greater 
part of the interior is taken up with monuments of 
prelates and relics of saints, which are interesting only 
as they tell us of the idolatry and superstition of 
Rome. 

I witnessed a number of confessions, where kneeling 
women were pouring out their sorrow in the ears of 
priests, no doubt giving confidences that should have 
been given rather to their own husbands or fathers, or 
to God. I stood for a few minutes and witnessed the 
so-called religious service, where, amid smoking 
incense, these zealots were presumably worshiping God 
and adoring the Virgin. 

I paid twenty-five centimes (five cents), and began 
the ascent of the tower. It is five hundred steps up, 
and they are not easily taken. Guides offered their 
services, but I did not see of what possible use they 
could be to me, yet, in places where I came out on the 
roof, and was confused by the number of minarets 
about and above me, it would have been a little more 
comfortable to have had someone tell me where to go 



108 WANDERINGS IN EUROPE. 

next. I was walking slowly along the marble roof, 
when I met some Americans, and innocently asked 
them if I were near the top. The reply was that I had 
a full half-day's work before me. I said I thought that 
whatever work I had on hand just now was above me, 
while theirs seemed to be in the opposite direction. I 
went up above the dome, and above a forest of white 
minarets, that stood up like ice-covered pines on the 
mountain side. I laughed at myself for taking hold of 
the marble projections to see if they were secure, and 
yet I found myself doing this again and again, regard- 
less of the ridicule I subjected myself to from myself, 
for I was alone. 

At last the highest point was gained, and in wonder- 
ing amazement I looked down on the spires below me. 
I was on a mountain top, and from this exalted posi- 
tion, I saw all about the mountain sides the snow-white 
minarets. They seemed to be numberless, and white 
as the wings of a dove, bathed in the full light of a 
noonday sun. The city of nearly three hundred and 
fifty thousand inhabitants appeared to be very little. 

I am told, that as men rise the things from which 
they have risen seem small. It is not right, for that 
by which any one has risen should always be respected. 
The cathedral became a motherly hen, and the houses 
of Milan, like dutiful chickens, were gathered near, as 
if to be taken under her protecting wings. 



MILAN COPIES VENICE. 109 

Milan is one of the most modem wide-awake cities 
in Europe. The Galleria Viitorio Emanuele, near 
the cathedral, is a most inviting place. To us the name 
gave no idea of the place, and a description will nec- 
essarily be imperfect. It is a vast arcade, formed 
where two streets cross each other. For a distance of 
nearly one thousand feet these streets are covered over 
with high glass arches. Where the streets cross, there 
is a splendid dome, one hundred and eighty feet in 
height. The whole is in the form of a Latin cross. 
Along these covered ways are elegant shops and res- 
taurants, and here and there are graceful statues by 
the sidewalks. Here, every evening in summer, the 
Milanese resort. It is the Square of St. Mark's repeated 
again. Milan is copying Venice. The same good 
order prevails here that does at Venice. It must also 
pay the city in a business way, for the shops in the 
arcade bring fabulous rents, and the city is careful to 
secure its full share of the revenue. 

But Milan contains one treasure that no visitor 
should fail to see. Taking a street-car, we ask for the 
church of the Grazie (Graces), and hasten to the little 
chapel that contains the treasure. It is here that the 
great work of Leonardo da Vinci was executed. Here 
the ruins of that masterpiece are still to be seen. The 
fame of " The Last Supper" is world wide, and will be 
cherished when the work itself has perished, and 



110 WANDERINGS IN EUROPE. 

naught but poor copies of it remain. The little chapel 
is uninviting, and it seems strange that on the wall of 
this building such skill should have been displayed. 
The picture was executed about the close of the fif- 
teenth century. It was not appreciated as of any 
value, and has experienced some strange fortunes. It 
was badly smoked by a kitchen stove, probably flooded, 
parts of it cut away by the monks, who opened a 
doorway through the wall on which it was painted, 
and, if possible, a worse fate befell it when some stupid 
artists attempted to restore it. The wall on which it 
is painted is scaling off, and taking flecks of the 
figures along with the scales. 

I had regarded the enthusiasm excited by this pict- 
ure as mere sentiment. Anyone will have the same 
feeling who judges it by the copies that are to be 
found in every city. I was disappointed when I looked 
on it from a distance. The mark paid for admission 
seemed to be wasted. But coming nearer I took a 
chair and sat down deliberately to study the world- 
renowned painting. The pose and expression of the 
different figures impressed me. I found myself say- 
ing, almost aloud : 

"What beauty in the repose of that sweet face!" 

" What wonderful mildness of expression ! 5? 

"How symmetrical the hand that lies opened with 
the palm turned upward ! " 



A MASTERPIECE. HI 

u See the cups partly filled with wine, and the scat- 
tered fragments of bread ! w 

I never saw a picture thst appealed to rne as this 
one did. How could the stupid monks fail to see its 
beauty ? How could even the common soldiery of 
Napoleon fail to be touched with the pictured gentle- 
ness of that Blessed One who said, '"Put up thy 
sword, for all that take the sword shall perish by the 
sword ? " 

Yet there are some things to criticise. Ruskin would 
have all pictures true. But here the figures are all 
conveniently arranged so that the artist could take 
them in ; not one of them is reclining, as was the cus- 
tom at Eastern meals. John is leaning away from 
Jesus, and not on his breast. 

The painting is now nearly four hundred years old, 
and it looks as though in ten years more it might be 
entirely lost. Thus it is with all the works of man. 
They perish. The strong castle, built by rough hand:?, 
and the delicate touches of the brush must pass away, 
but the colorings of light and shade left on human 
hearts will endure. The painting can not outlast the 
canvas or the wall, and human skill finds its limit 
here. He who influences one life for good is the 
greatest artist, and produces the most enduring work. 
That influence may be exerted by tongue or pen or 
brush, or by the unspoken sympathy of a soul that 



112 WANDERINGS IN EUROPE. 

substitutes a look for a word. A half-dozen artists were 
seated before this painting, making copies of it. We did 
not stop to examine their work, though it was fresh and 
easily seen. When da Vinci's work was before us, 
why should we linger a minute at the side of a mere 
copyist ? After seeing his work, I did not wonder that 
in the beautiful Plaza della Scala, at the end of the 
arched street, of which I have written, there should 
be a fine monument to da Vinci, with busts of his 
most eminent pupils about it. The fairest monument, 
however, he erected for himself in " The Last Supper," 
and universal regret must be felt that it was neglected 
so long, and that it must perish so soon. 

Good-by to Italy, with its bright skies, into whose 
far-away depths I have looked for an hour. Why did 
we not linger here another month ? Ten years would 
be all too few to satisfy the soul that delights in com- 
munion with all that is fairest in art. The friend 
lingers an hour beyond the allotted time, and finds it 
much harder then to step beyond the threshold than 
he would have done had he departed when the moment 
arrived. The land that is richest in art is debased by 
superstition. May she be freed from it and enlight- 
ened by the sweet simplicity of Gospel truth ! We 
hasten to the land of Tell. 

Switzerland is the playground of Europe and the 
resting place for America. When Germany and 



ENGINEERING SKILL. 1 J 3 

England have a cholera fright, they hurry off to 
Switzerland. When the heat becomes oppressive, 
Parisians seek Alpine villages. It is a relief to get 
away from man's w r ork to God's, away from paintings 
to snow-clad mountains and bold rivers and frightened 
cascades. Switzerland is only a little country, not 
being twice as large as New Jersey, and most of it is 
composed of mountains and lakes. But the world 
would be far less beautiful if Switzerland did not 
form a part of it. From Milan to Lucerne, by the St. 
Gotthard Road, is a distance of one hundred and sev- 
enty-six miles, and the time of travel is about ten hours. 
It seems as though this were slow traveling, but if you 
will take the ride you will be thoroughly convinced 
that the rate of speed is sufficiently high for the safety 
of the passengers and for their comfort as well. 

The engineering skill displayed on the St. Gotthard 
Road is not excelled anywhere. The engine boldly 
enters a mountain, as one would suppose, to find its 
iron pathway directly through it, but this would be 
impossible, for the tunnel would need to be many miles 
long before the proper grade could be reached. In 
place, therefore, of going directly through the mount- 
ain, it winds up in a curved tunnel on the inside, 
making, in one instance, near Dazio Grande, two com- 
plete loops. Imagine a corkscrew road, with two turns 
inside the mountain, and you have the best illustration 

8 



114 WANDERINGS IN EUROPE. 

that can be given in words. Going from Milan, the 
road pierces the mountain and comes out again at a 
higher level, after making the inside curves, and if 
you are going in the opposite direction, the train 
winds down in place of up the tunnel. Yet the road 
is so well constructed that there is as little jarring as 
there is on any of our roads built on the plain. 

A finely educated gentleman from Greece sat in the 
compartment with us. He spoke all languages prob- 
ably better than English. I thought it was a splendid 
chance to brighten up a little in German with him. 
I even ventured to tell him a little pleasantry we have 
in our home about my having five boys, while my wife 
claims that she has six. I knew he understood me, for 
he laughed heartily and wakened up the interest of a 
Spaniard who was in the compartment. The gentle- 
man told the story to him in Spanish, and it so amused 
him that he reached over and took my hand and said 
something that I did not understand, and which may 
have meant: 

" That is a very stupid thing to tell," but I inter- 
preted it to mean: 

" You are a good fellow and I am glad to ride in 
the same compartment with you." 

Then I looked over at the doctor, who was reading 
a Swiss paper, and caught his eye. He was disgusted 
with me. He even suggested, in a modest way, that 



JEALOUS OF MY GERMAN. H5 

when I was conversing with an educated gentleman 
who spoke English as well as I did, he would be 
somewhat prouder of me if I would not persist in 
cramming my broken Dutch on him. I saw in a 
moment that the doctor was jealous of my accomplish- 
ments and felt it his duty to humble me. I did not 
humble, but kept on talking to the professor in Ger- 
man, using the masculine pronoun for the feminine, 
and both of them for the neuter, and making such 
blunders that I finally disgusted the doctor, and at the 
next stop he left the compartment. I am sure that I 
did the best I could, and the professor told me that 
if I would study I could become an expert in talking 
German. I suppose he meant that I would not be so 
modest that I would refuse to speak it. 

Then I fell into a serious mood of reflection. Plow 
does it come that we always want to do something 
that we can not do ? I think that the doctor wants to 
preach. I suggested to him, that as I knew so much 
about diagnosticating diseases, I would study medicine 
with him. He reminded me of several times that I 
had mistaken mumps for chicken-pox, and rheumatism 
for consumption. I could not remember the instances, 
but they were firmly fixed in his mind, so I marked 
this down to jealousy again. But why he should be 
jealous of my German, I could not imagine, so 1 sought 
him out in the other compartment, and asked him to 



116 WANDERINGS IN EUROPE. 

explain himself. When he gave me a full interpre- 
tation of his feelings, I was so much humiliated, that I 
refused to leave the compartment again. Some of his 
friends had brought in a basket of fruit, and I had 
accepted an invitation to share it with him. The 
scholar must have missed me. 

We were in the midst of the Alps, and the clouds 
began to gather about the mountain-tops. I had 
spoken of the forces of the air mustering there, and 
expected the doctor to compliment me on the elegance 
of the figure. He was in a poetical mood, and 
observed that the clouds were quite demonstrative. 
Someone asked how. He replied that they were kiss- 
ing the mountain's brow. 

I supposed that they only kissed the brow because 
the mountain was older than the clouds, and they 
wanted to be reverent, like the young wife of an old 
husband, who tries to kiss away the wrinkles. It 
began to rain, and I proposed a conundrum. 

" Why are the clouds like Jacob ? " 

No one seemed to know much about Jacob, except 
that he had stolen Esau's blessing, so I had to explain 
that he wept after the osculatory process with Rachel. 

Below us was the sweet Valley of the Ticino, but 
a few rods wide. The Swiss have cultivated every 
foot of land along the stream, and up as far on the 
mountain-side as possible. It looked like a well-kept 



THE PROSE OF POVERTY. 117 

garden. Cottages here and there could be seen, but it 
is evident that the owners of the little half-acre 
farms live in villages, and these subject to avalanches, 
which cause great loss of life and property. There are 
drawbacks to the fairest portions of earth. The de- 
lightful roads of Continental Europe and the splendid 
railways have been built by a people who have lived 
on the coarsest food and received beggarly wages. If 
Europe paid less to her armies, and less to sustain a pen- 
sioned nobility, that neither toils nor spins, she would 
not have to withhold wages, fair and adequate, from 
her toilers. I am glad that labor in America is not 
pauperized, and am quite willing to pay duties on all 
I wear, if need be, rather than see my countrymen 
toiling as the people do in the East. (This was written 
before the election of 1892.) I have seen women 
cutting grass with the scythe, and when it was loaded 
on the cart, hitched to it, along with a dog and a cow, 
to haul it to the stable. The men are in the army, 
and poverty is in rags, to support soldiers, and noble- 
men, and royalty. Poetry becomes dull prose, and 
titles lose their dignity, when seen in the light of 
unrewarded toil. The law given in Holy Writ ought 
to be maintained throughout the world : " If any 
toil not, neither shall he eat;" and "The laborer is 
worthy of his hire." 

We left the train at Fluellen, on Lake Lucerne, and 



118 WANDERINGS IN EUROPE. 

embarked on a steamer for Lucerne. Here we met 
many tourists, whom we had seen at different places. 
These pleasant greetings began now to form an im- 
portant part of the pleasures of our tour : 

" We were together on the Brittanic ! " 

" We met in Venice ! " 

" I saw you in London ! " 

I wondered if, when we get to heaven, we will 
recall those with whom we have passed a salutation 
on earth ! 

Will some kind stranger say, 

" I always wanted to meet you, since something you 
said, or wrote, with tear-dimmed eyes, has shed a ray 
of light on my path, and helped me to get here ? " 

The ride by steamer was a delight, after the nine 
hours on the train. We passed by TelPs Chapel and 
Schiller's Rock ; looked up to the Eigi on the one 
hand, and to Pilatus on the other, and just at dark 
arrived at the beautiful little city of Lucerne, with its 
many hotels, clustering about the western end of the 
lake. We were very fortunate in finding every room 
of the down-town hotels occupied, and were compelled 
to go to the Hotel de V Europe, some distance east. 
Here we secured rooms fronting the lake, and from 
our windows we looked across the quiet waters to the 
mountains, clothed in white. The rising moon gave 
an added charm to the far-off mountain, while its 



A WRINKLED GOWN. 119 

light fell, in a silvery baptism, on the waters of Lu- 
cerne. 

The guests at the hotel had retired, the noise on 
the street had ceased ; yet I sat, a lone watcher, by 
my window, and looked at the wondrous scene. In 
mute admiration, I worshiped Him u who giveth snow 
like wool," and causeth " the moon to shine by night." 
Words would have been a mockery at such an hour, 
as they could not have expressed the emotion of the 
soul. 

The rest day came in Lucerne, and we sought out a 
school-hall, where Presbyterian services were held. It 
was in an out-of-the-way place, and almost everything 
about the service was out of the way. The singing 
was poor, and the sermon was in perfect harmony 
with the music. For some reason or other, the 
preacher felt that he would not be at home unless he 
wore a gown. A gown in Presbyterian circles is get- 
ting to be stylish, and possibly the taste in this direc- 
tion is not to be condemned ; although a manly dress 
is always more becoming to a man than a womanly 
one. But, in this case, the preacher's gown was one 
to attract attention. It was mussed up, and wrinkled, 
and looked as though it might have been as long in a 
little hand-bag as Jonah was in the fish. It is always 
painful to me to see a minister make himself ridiculous 
by appearing clerical, under any circumstance, and 



120 WANDERINGS IN EUROPE. 

specially so when the attempt is as silly as the desire. 
I had been looking at the comely in nature, and was in 
no mood to tolerate the uncomely in art. The sur- 
roundings, and wrinkled gown, and poor music, would 
have made it impossible for a man to preach well. He 
did not attempt the impossible. 

After sermon we sat down to lunch, when, to our 
surprise and pleasure, Mr. and Mrs. Case, whom we 
had met at The Hague, came in, and sat at our table. 
It was a most pleasant meeting for us. The doctor 
had occasion to render some professional services, 
which were highly appreciated, and he did not have 
to wait many days to get a return for the bread he 
was casting on the waters. 

I proposed to the doctor that we take a bath in the 
lake, next morning, early. He agreed, and Mr. Case 
was to join us. The lake looked cold, and I had no 
idea that my proposal would be accepted, or I would 
not have made it. I wanted to appear courageous, 
and tell them how refreshing it would be. I studied 
several plans to disconcert the agreement, but all to 
no avail. I began to get interested in the doctor's 
health, and told him the early bath, in the cold 
water, might be injurious to him. 

He looked incredulous. 

I suggested that it might bring on neuralgia, or 
rheumatism, or sciatica, or jumping toothache. My 



UNAPPRECIATED KINDNESS. 121 

medical talk spoiled it all. If he were about to yield 
before, he refused now and became firm. It would be 
invigorating and better than any tonic. He needed it, 
and he knew that it would aid my circulation, sending 
the blood spinning all through my body. It would be 
specially helpful to me in using the German language. 
I consented when he said this, knowing how eager he 
was for my welfare, but inwardly resolved that it 
would not be convenient for me to be awake next 
morning before eight o'clock. But even this last 
resort failed, for I overheard him giving directions to 
the porter, that we should be called at six. 

When we reached the bath-house, Mr. Case had 
already taken his plunge and was about to retire. I 
hurried into the lake first. It is so hard, when water 
is cold, to get wet all at once, and I wanted to help 
the doctor get used to it gradually by throwing a 
few handfuls at him from long range. The plan 
worked to perfection, only for some reason he did not 
seem to appreciate my kindness as highly as he might 
have done. But having heard that we ought not to 
cease our good offices because of man's ingratitude, I 
did not desist until he was swimming gracefully far 
beyond his depth. The water was as clear as crystal. 
When about to come out, I was horrified to see my 
friend, with a look of pain on his face, swimming 
toward me with one hand. His left arm was dislocated. 



122 WANDERINGS IN EUROPE. 

and only because he was at home in the water, 
was he able to reach me in safety. It was to me 
strange, that, able to use but one arm, and suffering 
as he did, he gained the shore at all. Mr. Case took 
charge of him while I dressed hastily and set off 
to find a physician. Remember, if you please, that 
we were in Lucerne, where not one person in a hun- 
dred knows a single word of English. A surgeon, 
however, was secured, and he, after examining the 
dislocation, sent for an assistant. It seemed an age to 
wait, but while we waited the doctor's face suddenly 
brightened up, and he declared that the ball had gone 
back into its socket again. It was true, and when 
the second surgeon arrived with a can of chloroform, 
there was nothing for him to do. 

I may be uncharitable, but I thought I saw on the 
second surgeon's face a look of disappointment. 
When he was informed, however, that the patient was 
a physician, he rejoiced with us and was full of con- 
gratulations, I suppose, for he spoke in a foreign 
tongue. There was a learned discussion as to how the 
happy result had been secured without surgical aid. 
The theory that he had touched the bones of some old 
saint was not favorably received, for this would have 
implied that he had not been in good company when 
I was with him in the water. 

Every visitor at Lucerne is expected to ascend the 



EASY CLIMBING. 123 

Rigi. The journey is easily made by the cog-wheel 
road up the mountain side. Taking the boat to Yitz- 
nau, a little town on the lake, we began the ascent, 
which occupied one hour and twenty minutes. The 
word Rigi means strata, and in climbing the mount- 
ain, the appropriateness of the name becomes appar- 
ent. But the Rigi is only five thousand nine hundred 
and five feet high, and therefore does not come up to 
the shoulders of Pike's Peak. But the singularly 
isolated position of the mountain gives a view that is 
said to be three hundred miles in circumference. As 
I did not make the circuit, I will not be responsible 
for the accuracy of the figures. 

If one anticipate ruggedness on the Rigi he will be 
disappointed, particularly by this route. The mount- 
ain sides are, in some places, precipitous, but, to the 
highest point, the grass is growing, and cattle and 
sheep are feeding. But the general impression is 
favorable, and as you look away in the distance to 
the white-robed Jungfrau, whose snowy vesture has 
never been touched by mortal hand, you do not won- 
der why every tourist ascends the Rigi. Hotels are 
on the summit, and many tourists remain over night, 
to see the sun rise on the far-off mountains. But it 
has a habit of raining there so often, and the sun rises 
as early as four o'clock, and considering these things, 
and being also reasonably well persuaded that the 



124 WANDERINGS IN EUROPE. 

sun would be prompt, without our efforts, we con- 
cluded to sleep in the valley. 

Very near the city is the Lion of Lucerne. This is 
a bas-relief, cut in the solid rock — not in a rock hewn 
from the quarry, but in its natural bed, on the mount- 
ain side. It is twenty-eight feet long, and is in com- 
memoration of the bravery of the Swiss guard who 
fell defending the Tuilleries, on August 10, 1792. It 
was celebration week when we were at Lucerne, and 
the little city was full of enthusiasm. The poverty of 
the display made was in strange contrast with the 
sacrifice offered. But as that offering was in defense 
of royalty, the Republic of France could not be 
expected to unite with Switzerland in honoring the 
two qualities which go to make up the great soldier — 
bravery and fidelity even to death. 

We did not omit a visit to the Glacier Garden, 
hard by the Lion's Rock. Here you are pointed out 
many glacial mills, as they are called. They look 
like great pots made in the solid rocks, by the action 
of the ice rivers in the long ago. Some of them are 
about fifteen feet in depth, and the sides show that 
they have been ground out by revolving stones. It 
is probably true that there was a time when a great 
part of the Northern Hemisphere was buried under 
mighty masses of ice. But the teachings of science are 
somewhat peculiar, as one of the most distinguished 



MOUNT BLANC, 125 

geologists in America is instructing us that the earth 
is slowly growing colder, and that, after awhile, it 
will be uninhabitable. Under these conditions a long 
lease would be quite as good a title as a deed of 
general warranty. But I am perplexed in attempting 
to reconcile this teaching with the icefield theory. 

It was our purpose to get as near Mount Blanc as 
we could, and we therefore started in that direction, 
arriving at the village of Martigny late in the evening. 




CHAPTER IX. 

HE route to Inter Laken may be richly 
varied by railway and boat, and will, as a 
pleasing picture, linger in memory with 
ever increasing delight. There comes to 
me now, as if in a panorama, the last sight of 
Lucerne, as the boat carried us over the lake to 
Alpnachstadt. A lingering look at Pilatus and the 
Rigi, and this part of the picture is folded away. The 
scenery on the route to Brienz is not so wild as you 
will find on the Rocky Mountains, but it is wonder- 
fully varied, and as one looks down at the Aare, he 
feels that the swiftly flowing river has been sent in 
haste on some errand, and is already belated, and 
eagerly seeks to out-do its past record. 

Scores of handsome cascades are leaping down the 
mountain-sides, some of which start out bravely, but 
are turned to mist long before they fall on the rocks 
below, where they are again collected, and flow on to 
the river as though they had not been broken to pieces 
by the fall, and lost to sight in the descent. Some 

wind down the rocks like silver threads, while many 

(126) 



UNDER THE CART. 127 

of larger volume go with the ardor of the race-horse, 
that spurns the earth, and scatters the white foam from 
his widely extended nostrils. 

The scenery of the Briinig Pass has been so often 
described, that the traveler is prepared in some degree 
for the delights afforded him. At Brienz we take the 
steamer for Inter Laken, passing Giessbach, justly 
famed for the beautiful falls of a stream, whose source 
is in the Schwarzhorn Mountain. There are seven of 
these falls, the highest one being eleven hundred and 
forty-eight feet above the lake. The lowest one can be 
seen from the steamer. Inter Laken, as its name 
imports, is between two lakes, on a low land that has 
probably been formed by the soil washed down from 
the mountain-sides, thus dividing the great lake in two 
parts, one of which is called Brienz, and the other 
Thun. 

We took an evening drive by a pleasant road, pass- 
ing through a Swiss village, into whose cottages we 
were permitted to get an occasional glance. That 
look convinced us that the tidiness which has been so 
generally accorded to the Swiss may at least have 
some exceptions. A heavy rain came on, and while 
we drove along, we saw many carts loaded with hay. 
The women who had been pulling in the loads had 
stopped by the way-side, and sought shelter under the 
carts. I was glad to see that there was this much 



128 WANDERINGS IN EUROPE, 

advantage afforded them over the horses and cattle, 
which would have been compelled to remain in the 
rain. There is something better in the lot of a 
woman in Switzerland than there is in the condition 
of an ox. The woman can disengage herself, and get 
under her load, while the ox must remain in the 
harness. 

We had planned for a visit to the Rhone Glacier, 
but the tourist in Switzerland must be prepared for 
many disappointments, or else take many excursions 
which he can not enjoy, because of the rains. The 
visit to the glacier was abandoned, and possibly it 
would not have been my good fortune to write these 
lines, if we had done this, for many idiots are lost every 
year when attempting to cross the rivers of ice. 

The ride by boat and cars to Martigny is not so full 
of interest as that which we have passed over, but it 
is necessary to be at Martigny, to secure passage over 
the Tete-Noire Pass, to Chamounix, the evening before 
you make the journey. Here we met Miss Halsted, 
and her party, who had been wrecked on the ill-fated 
City of Chicago. We were kindly permitted to join 
their party, and together we secured carriages for 
Chamounix. 

The morning was delightful, and the scenery was 
largely a repetition of what we had enjoyed before. 
The distance is only twenty-three miles, but owing to 



RAIN ON THE ALPS. 129 

the grade, requires seven hours. One looks with 
interest at the great St. Bernard Road, over which 
the Roman army, and the troops of Charlemagne, of 
Frederic Barbarossa, and Napoleon I. marched. 
There are places where the carriage seems to hang 
over the verge of the cliffs, and one considers the pos- 
sibilities of escape in case of accident. The driver, 
however, here becomes a leader. One of the horses is 
taken from the carriage, and the patient fellow walks 
at the horse's head, carefully leading him down the 
grade by the bridle. 

It rains nearly every day in Switzerland, and the 
hope that this day would be an exception began to 
fade away. It looked like rain. The clouds were mar- 
shaling their forces. I was without waterproof, but, 
fortunately, seated in the carriage where I would be 
protected if it rained. Two ladies, one of whom was 
from Chicago, and the other a fair young violinist, both 
from the steamer City of Chicago^ were on the front 
seat. Sitting there, they had no protection from the 
storm. If it rained, I would surely have to be polite, 
and exchange my seat with them. 

It rained. u Ladies, will you be so kind as to come 
back here, and permit me to ride in the rain ? " 

It took some courage to say that, but I said it, and 
felt myself a taller man for being so self-sacrificing. 

" O no, sir, thank you ! We chose these seats for 



130 WANDERINGS IN EUROPE, 

better or worse, just as a woman does when she takes 
a husband. In this case, as often in that, it proves to 
be for worse, but we propose to abide by our own 
choice." 

Here was the true spirit, and I knew that it would 
be safe now for me to insist on going out. The ladies 
wrapped their waterproofs about them, and sat out, 
while I sat in. When we reached Chamounix, I 
expressed my gratitude. 

" Young ladies, I have five sons ! " 

" So many ! We thought you had sons, and so were 
kind to you, but we did not dream that you had so 
many." 

" You may have your choice — blonde or brunette." 

Then they wanted to know which one was most 
like his father, supposing that, if they drew him, he 
would permit them to sit out " till the clouds rolled 

by." 

We had come far to see Mount Blanc. But the 
mountain was not on exhibition, his person was veiled 
by impenetrable mists. If we did not see the mount- 
ain, we had seen enough to delight us. The glaciers, 
extending down nearly to the road, could not be hid- 
den, and when first I looked on them, I experienced 
that indescribable pang which takes hold on the heart 
like the clutch of an iron hand. It is not surprise, it is 
not awe, but rather a commingling of the two feelings, 



ROBES OF PURITY. 131 

producing an emotion, to express which no word 
has ever been framed. During the night I arose sev- 
eral times and looked out toward the mountain, but 
the veil was still over it. Each time I retired disap- 
pointed. After all I was not to see Mount Blanc. No 
matter what or how much we enjoy in life, if there be 
one thing denied us, we fret like spoiled children. We 
may say "sour grapes 5 ' of the good unattained, but 
we know that they are sweet, and sweeter far because 
they are beyond our reach. 

I fell soundly asleep and dreamed of hidden glory 
that words could not express, and x>f visions such as 
the apostle bad, so near us, but between them and us 
there floated a cloud. The door of my room was 
opened and I heard a voice : 

" Doctor, get up quickly and see Mount Blanc ! " 
To my delight the clouds were gone, the murky 
veil had been torn aside, and the queen of mountains 
shone forth in robes of spotless purity ! With a strong 
glass we looked into the fissures in the glaciers hun- 
dreds of feet in depth, where many venturesome trav- 
elers have lost their lives. For miles the eternal 
snows appeared without a wrinkle ; then the surface 
was broken by abrupt precipices, clear and distinct as 
though cut with a knife. Again, square blocks of 
glistening ice and snow stood up, shaven down, as it 
were, on all sides, as definitely as though the mountain's 



132 WANDERINGS IN EUROPE. 

God had measured them with square and compass. 
We could, by the telescope, see a party of tourists with 
ropes attached to their persons binding them together 
seeking out a way to the summit. A short time after- 
ward I saw that the papers published the account of 
the loss of a traveler and guide who had been deceived 
by the new-fallen snow, and stumbled over one of 
the precipices. 

We took our breakfast by a window looking out on 
the mountain. 

Never until my eyes are opened to see no more 
darkly do I hope for another such vision. 

An hour later we took our seats on a char-a-banc and 
were off for Cluse, where we take the cars for Geneva. 
I had some difficulty in getting the name of the vehi 
cle in which we were to travel, but taking up the 
word in the old spelling-school fashion, I got it at last 
fixed in my memory; c-h-a-r char-a chara b-a-n-c banc, 
charabanc. It is an immense omnibus drawn by five 
horses, and has a seating capacity on the outside for 
twenty-four persons. Our friends from the hotel came 
out to see the charabanc, but we insisted that they came 
simply to see us off. It is never wrong to put the 
most favorable construction on the conduct of others. 

The twenty-seven miles to Cluse is made in four and 
one-half hours. For an hour we had the glaciers in 
sight, and then scenery of mountains and valleys, where 




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w 

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A DELUGE OF MUD. 133 

the peasants were engaged in bringing in the harvests 
of wheat and oats. The ride was so restful, that had 
it not been for fear of a fate similar to that which befell 
the poor fellow who was present in body when Paul 
preached a long sermon, I would have fallen asleep. 

We passed the village of Saint Gervais, and a friend 
with a guide-book read that it was '''finely situated." 
It was not finely situated when we saw it. Like many 
other Swiss villages, it was situated in a narrow valley, 
and far above it were the mountains with their bur- 
dens of snow and ice. One of the glaciers had, for 
years, and it may be for centuries, been forming and 
adding to its heavy burdens. The lowest part of the 
glacier would melt away, and then the ice would sink 
into the soft earth gradually, but surely, forming an 
embankment, back of which, in the heat of summer, a 
great volume of water collected. As each successive 
year the glacier pressed down farther on this embank- 
ment, it became stronger, and was enlarged in extent. 
The present summer (1892) was unusually warm, and 
the volume of water became so great, that the embank- 
ment could not resist the pressure, but gave way, and 
was carried down the mountain side, making a great 
river of mud. It flooded the town of Saint Gervais, 
filling the streets, and covering or sweeping away 
houses, and destroying the lives of twenty-two of the 
villagers. It was Johnstown on a smaller scale, but the 



134 WANDERINGS IN EUROPE. 

impetus of these waters was even greater than those, 
and its power was doubled, because it was liquid earth 
mingled with rocks that smote the doomed village. It 
was two weeks after this terrible visitation that we 
passed along the road where the finely situated town 
had been, Men were at work unearthing the houses, 
and getting ready to begin life again, in the hope that 
many years must necessarily elapse before a similar 
catastrophe could occur. 

The peasant can live safely on the mountains during 
the summer months, and find there good pasture for 
his cows, but when the winter approaches he comes 
down to his cottage nearer the plain, and takes his cows 
into the same house . in which he lives. They have 
different apartments, but are covered by the same roof, 
and protected by the same walls. Poverty takes away 
the poetry from the life of the Swiss peasantry. They 
can not hope to rise above their present condition, and 
in fact they have but little seeming desire to do more 
than make a living. In this they are like the peas- 
antry of all Europe. 

The Alps are not so rugged as our mountains. There 
are no such bold chasms as may be seen on the Rio 
Grande Road. With us the timber line is definitely 
marked, but in Switzerland there is no special line but 
that of snow. With us the snow in summer lies in 
deep gorges, and the bold projections of the mountains 



ETERNAL SNOWS. 135 

are rocks uncovered and dark, while the waters rush 
down through these gorges into great wide-mouthed 
canyons, but in Switzerland the whole mountain is 
covered with snow, and as it melts, the streams find 
their way directly down the mountain sides, in many 
places not having worn their course, and leaping from 
sharp projections, which may in years be worn into 
gorges. Thus cataracts are formed which bewilder us 
with their beauty and boldness. The glacier can be 
formed only where there are two peaks, the ice river 
forming between them, but a hundred streams may 
issue from a single mountain slope, whose waters rush 
to the plain before the winter's rigor comes to bind 
them to the rocks. 

Mount Blanc is 15,730 feet high, but those who are 
ambitious to ascend the highest mountain in Europe 
can have their desires gratified at a cost of about fifty 
dollars in gold, and with some chances of their families 
realizing on their life-insurance policies at an early 
date. It is said that the view from the summit is not 
good, and snow all about you becomes, after awhile, 
a little monotonous, but then you can have an Alpine 
stock and get someone to carve on it the words, "Mount 
Blanc." I felt that I had a right to do this because 
I had seen the mountain. 

Geneva is the largest and most wealthy city of Switz- 
erland. It is celebrated as the home of John Calvin, 



136 WANDERINGS IN EUROPE. 

and also for the manufacture of watches. But there 
is no place you will go where time is as poorly 
kept as in Geneva. Chronometers do not agree, and 
your own timepiece, that has always been right, begins 
to confuse you by not agreeing with any other watch 
in the city. The house in which John Calvin lived is 
shown the visitor, and aside from the fact that the great 
doctrinarian did much of his labor there, it has no 
interest whatever. The church in which he preached 
is in excellent repair, and services are still held in it. 
The eloquence of Calvin is commented on freely, and 
his great work in the cause of the reformation will 
excite the gratitude of those who are willing to honor 
the truth, no matter to what part of the evangelical 
church they may be attached. After his return from 
banishment in 1538, he gained almost absolute power, 
and this he exercised with undue rigor. But he is not 
to be judged in the light of our times, and the tyranny 
of the past may have been no worse than the liberty 
of the future, if it be turned into licentiousness. 

My friend could not forget the treatment of the 
Spanish physician who was arrested, although not con- 
demned, by the order of Calvin. He insisted on seeing 
the place where Servetus was burned, but no one 
seemed to be aware of the fact that the Spanish 
heretic was treated so warmly by inhospitable Geneva. 
We may, while condemning intolerance, show so much 



JOHN CALVIN. 137 

bitterness that we condemn ourselves for that of which 
we accuse Calvin. Pretended liberalists sometimes 
talk so harshly of the defects of Calvin that I am 
inclined to think they would have shown their hatred of 
persecution by burning the persecutor, if he were alive. 
Let us remember that we are more than three centu- 
ries away from the struggles of Geneva and rejoice in 
a system that has done much to give us our religious 
freedom. While we may neither justify nor yet make 
apologies for sixteenth-century cruelty, let us be fair 
enough to judge it and condemn it in the light of the 
sixteenth, and not of the nineteenth century. The 
same broad charity that would have saved the life of a 
sixteenth-century heretic ought to consider well the 
circumstances of time and place before passing judg- 
ment. The work of the great reformer has been 
established in Geneva and all the vicissitudes of 
fortune to which the city has been subjected have 
not been able to destroy that work. 

Within a few miles of Geneva, Voltaire lived. One 
may be a champion of freedom, and yet reject the only 
foundation stone on which that temple can be erected. 
The ride to Coppet, of one hour by steamer, to the 
house of Madame de Stael, and to the chapel in which 
her body is buried, is taken by many who have read 
" Corinne," and, with her glowing descriptions in mind, 
have paid a visit to Italy. The life of this gifted 



138 WANDERINGS IN EUROPE. 

woman is so full of adventure that one feels tempted 
to turn aside from his tour to study it. A melancholy 
interest attaches to it. Her mind was gifted, and 
her ability to draw pen pictures has seldom been 
equaled. The magic of her name, the cruelties to 
which she was subjected, the power that she had over 
the people, the terror that she inspired in the hearts 
of rulers, the generous sympathy she expressed to the 
cause of freedom, her associations with the most emi- 
nent writers of her time, her idolatry of literary fame, 
her weakness in concealing her marriage that she 
might not be compelled to give up the name bearing 
which she had secured her power, read almost like a 
romance, and yet truth is stranger than fiction. Over 
her grave is the inscription in Latin : " Here at last 
rests one who never rested." 

It is strange to see the blue waters of the Rhone 
and the muddy, clay-colored waters of the Arve flow- 
ing quite a distance in the same channel before they 
commingle. It looks as though the pure Rhone were 
unwilling to be one with her dishonored sister. Both 
streams came from mountain heights; both were born 
in the snow, but one has carried more of the defile- 
ment of earth with her than the other. Two people 
who associate intimately for years with each other 
will, after a while, grow into one likeness. Happily 
the Arve accepts the blue of the Rhone, and loses 



A HAPPY UNION. 139 

its dull gray. It is thus in life; the stronger nature 
predominates over the weaker. But the weaker nature 
may be the best favored, and, as in the vision of the 
cattle, the lean and ill-favored may devour the fairer 
ones, and yet remain as poor and hungry and ugly as 
they were before. 

But the city of the great reformer needs to secure 
a better reputation for honesty. The most outrageous 
overcharges, for everything, may be expected, and 
there is but little use in protesting. Make your visits 
brief. 

We left Geneva late in the evening, having secured 
sleeping-car tickets, for which we paid about twice as 
much as we would have had to pay in America. We 
were booked to Paris, and entered the proper car, 
where we gave up our tickets to the porter, and 
sought our compartments. Such a sleeping-car, at 
home, would never be sent out on a second trip. An 
indignant public would surely " ditch it." 

I was growling, in regular Western style, about the 
stuffy little places where human beings were to be 
stowed away, when the guards came to the window. 
They began demanding something, I knew not what. 
They indicated that there was something wrong, and 
that it must be made right immediately. A gentle- 
man from Virginia, seated near me, said that they 
were demanding extra fare from me. I told him to 



140 WANDERINGS IN EUROPE. 

tell them that if they would give me back the money 
I had already paid them, I would settle the matter by 
going into the day-coach, which was far more com- 
fortable than the sleeper could possibly be made. He 
told me that they refused. I answered, through him, 
that they had put me in this compartment ; that they 
had accepted my tickets ; that they refused to return 
my money in order to get me out, and that, under 
these conditions, I proposed to stay where I was. 
The gentleman assured me that the train had already 
been detained ten minutes on my account, and that 
they could not move it until they had the extra fare. 
I said I was not in a hurry. The gentleman said that 
his purse was at my disposal. I assured him that 
it was not a question of money, but of the rights of 
American citizens, and that they might stay there all 
night before I would give them any more. Then the 
conductor blew his little whistle and the train moved 
out. The porter said that he had made the mistake, 
and that he would have to lose the money himself. 
On hearing this we willingly gave him the extra fare. 
Then we began to retire. The doctor had a physi- 
cian with him in his compartment, and the two of them 
got along very comfortably. But there were four in 
the one I was placed in — -it was not large enough for 
two — a gentleman and his sister and an American 
student and myself. The gentleman told me that his 



SHUT YOUR EYES. 141 

sister was seriouslv embarrassed. He had a lower 
berth and she an upper. The distance between the two 
upper berths was about twelve inches, and there were 
no curtains. I agreed to let him go up and I would 
remain down. Later on, I heard the lady ask for the 
curtain. They did not have any curtain. I gave the 
young student the same caution I have often heard a 
young mother give a little child when she is impatient 
for it to go to sleep, and told him that it was cheaper 
for the company to have the passengers shut their 
eyes than it was to buy curtains. The car had but one 
wash-bowl, and it in so small a closet that you had no 
space for bending over to keep the water from dripping 
on your person. The charge was in inverse proportion 
to the accommodations. If I have any friends whose 
comfort is dear to me, I would say to them, never, 
under any circumstances, take a sleeper in Europe, 
unless it be in Germany; and if I had any enemies, and 
were wic ked enough to seek to take their punishment 
into my own hands, I would put them in a continental 
sleeper, where, if they did not smother to death before 
morning, they would certainly feel, when that morn- 
ing came, that life was not worth living. The student 
told me that he had met a Chicagoan a few days 
before, who, when eating black bread and unsalted 
butter, and drinking muddy coffee, expressed his grati- 
tude by saying, " This is what a man gets for going 



142 WANDERINGS IN EUROPE. 

away from home." Ordinary discomforts are easily 
forgotten in the pleasures of the morrow; but there 
has no joy come to my life so intense that I have been 
able to forget the night in the sleeper between Geneva 
and Paris. It may be that as I get older the impres- 
sions will gradually fade away from my memory, and 
if so, I will surely regard forgetfulness as one of the 
blessings of old age. 

I have often slept in the open air with my saddle 
for a pillow, and in feather beds that were so high I 
had to get on a chair to get in, but never did it fall to 
my lot to endure such drowsy torture as I experienced 
that night shutting ofi half my breathing capacity for 
the sake of my fellows in the compartment. 




CHAPTER X. 

T was early in the morning when we arrived 
at Paris. The first impression was that of 
an American city, but the cabmen did not 
seem to be so eager for passengers as with 
us in America. At the hotel we found some 
satisfaction in being addressed in well-spoken 
English. One of our boxes had been expressed from 
Heidelberg, and I proposed to the doctor that I would 
take a cab and get the box. He smiled, and said that 
we were in Paris, and my German would not avail me 
so much as it did elsewhere, but that if I felt competent 
to the undertaking, he would be delighted to be alone a 
little while. I was certain of success. I had a receipt 
for this box, that measures exactly eighteen by four- 
teen and one-half inches. Moreover, this receipt was 
on blue paper, a color that both in war and peace I 
have discovered to be a sure harbinger of success. 

I have a little advice to give the reader. Advice is 
about the only thing that I am anxious, to get rid of 
in the way of absolute gratuity. It weighs one down 

when he has it and sees so many people in need of it. 

(143) 



144 WANDERINGS IN EUROPE. 

He feels his importance when proffering it and can 
assume for the moment an air of true benevolence. 
It may be worth much or little, but that does not fig- 
ure in the case at all. There is no absolute value 
fixed on it. 

Many years ago a bombastic fellow was walking on 
a street in Washington, Pennsylvania. He was dressed 
in Parisian style, and on this particular morning wore 
a diamond pin, the precious stone being set in such a 
way as to make it appear several times larger than it 
really was. He looked down at the jewel with pride, 
and then up to bow to someone meeting him. Then 
he looked for the jewel again, and it was gone. There 
was the pin, with the rough catches that once held the 
jewel standing up ragged as the molar tooth of an old 
man who has lived on Florida beef for half a century, 
and found that while the inside of the tooth gave way, 
the enamel kept the outside from decay. It became 
like the outer walls of an extinct diminutive volcano. 
He began the search for the stone. Others joined 
him, and for an hour they looked on the sidewalk and 
in the gutter, but failed to find the object of their 
search. A little boy came trudging along to school 
and saw the men all looking to the ground. His bright 
eyes were bent in the same direction, and in an instant 
he saw something there of exceeding brilliancy. He 
stopped and took it in his hand, seeing which the 



SEEKING A BOX. 145 

gentleman walked up and claimed it. The little fellow 
readily gave it up and was turning away, when the 
generous soul of the stranger rose to the occasion. 

" Stop, my dear boy ! Stop one moment! How 
strange, how passing strange it is, that we men should 
spend an hour in earnest search for this diminutive, 
bright-eyed creature and fail to find it, when, as by 
the merest chance, this little boy should come along 
and pick it up. A thousand thanks, my lad ! A thou- 
sand thanks, and here are three cents as a reward for 
your great kindness. A thousand thanks ! " 

Fewer pennies, and more thanks, would have suited 
the boy better. 

Thanks are like advice, sometimes precious, but 
never very costly, unless it be to the recipient. My 
advice is this: If you contemplate a tour of the con- 
tinent, pick up a little French and German before 
you leave home, or else pick up a companion who has 
these useful accomplishments, and then cleave to him 
as fast as Ruth did to Naomi. I obtained instructions 
from the porter, and he called a cab and instructed 
the driver, who only knew that he was taking a stupid 
American to a certain station, for a certain box, for 
which the American had a receipt, and that the 
American was a youth, innocent of all Parisian ways 
and speech. The driver's duty was to take me to the 



10 



346 WANDERINGS IN EUROPE. 

station, and remain outside until I returned, and then 
bring me back again. 

A new road always seems longer than one with 
which we are familiar. It was a full half-hour before 
the cab stopped in front of the station. I went in, 
and asked at least fifty clerks for someone who spoke 
English. No answer. At last I stopped in front of a 
business-looking fellow and spoke. He looked at me 
as if to say : 

" What heathen country are you from, anyway ? 
And how do you expect me to understand a language 
that may be used only by cannibals ? " 

Then I took out my large receipt. 

He looked at it, and then at the ceiling. 

I wondered if he thought, from the size and color 
of the paper, that I was after the job of papering the 
office. He saw that it was written over. Then he 
looked at it more carefully, and wiped his spectacles, 
and looked at me. 

He took me to a second man, who looked at the 
receipt, and then at me. Not a word was spoken. 

He took me to a third man, who guessed at the 
meaning of the receipt, and looked over a large file 
of papers, which I supposed were duplicate receipts. 
I was happy now, for this man evidently knew what 
he was doing. But he handed me back the paper, 
saying something in French, and if he knew what he 



"DUNORD." 147 

was doing, I had at least the consolation of not know- 
ing what he was saying. 

It is well for some of us that we do not know what 
people are saying about us ; but when a man is speak- 
ing to us, it is better for us to know what he says. A 
happy thought struck me. It is possible for people to 
write so that we can understand them. The pronun- 
ciation is what is wrong with the French language. I 
handed him a pencil and piece of paper, and he wrote, 
in plain words, " du NordP I went out to my 
coachman, feeling now that I would soon be a French 
scholar, and said, " du Nord" The coachman smiled, 
and motioned for me to get in. He started at a rapid 
rate for " du NordP Here I went through the same 
operation as before, and looked over a pile of boxes, 
but failed to see ours. t 

The clerk said: " Gare de VJMP 

I suddenly lost all my linguistic pride. Pride goeth 
before destruction, I would have willingly con- 
fessed that I knew nothing of French — or even Ger- 
man, that I understood but little English, if it would 
have relieved me from my perplexity. I forgot all 
about the use of the pencil, which had helped me in 
the last station. He repeated the words that perplexed 
me. There seemed to be something about a garden, 
and about some sort of delay. Then a happy thought 



148 WANDERINGS IN EUROPE. 

came to me : I will try if they do not speak German, 
and began : 

" Spreehen sie Deuteh ? " 

Not one of the clerks spoke German. The situation 
was becoming alarming. The clerks were losing their 
patience. It was a losing game all around, except that 
the coachman was counting the hours. He was happy 
as he saw added to the usual charge for a trip to the 
station hours of time and more francs. 

I had determined not to return to the hotel without 
the box, and give the doctor an opportunity to ask me 
why I did not try " Dutch" with him, and add that 
these French people all understand the pure German 
readily. 

A lady came in walking with a younger lady, who 
resembled her so much that I saw the relationship of 
mother and daughter. They saw my perplexity. They 
turned and began talking to the clerk in French. " I 
never heard as ugly a language in my life as the 
French," I thought to myself. The lady smiled and 
said u America." I took courage. She turned and 
addressed me in a pitying sort of way and said, " Gave 
deVEst." 

I was to be mocked with those words all the time. 
What had I done that I should be tortured so ? Was 
I being punished for talking German to the professor? 



A WOMAN TALKS. 149 

The lady smiled at my confusion, and I bowed most 
profoundly and said : 

" Pardon me, but does Madame speak English ? " 

" O, yes, quite readily," she answered in as sweet, 
plain-spoken words as you ever heard. How interest- 
ing she became. I was willing to be entertained by 
anyone that spoke my mother tongue. She was evi- 
dently a lady, and, regarding the proprieties of the 
occasion, asked promptly: 

" What will Monsieur have ? " 

" I would have Madame talk," I replied, believing 
that it would not offend her so much if I slightly 
varied the usual order of our words. 

Again she laughed and said: " The easiest thing in 
the world for a woman to do. But what would you 
have me say ? " 

" Honor me by saying in English what he is trying 
to tell me in French." 

" He says that your trunk is not here, and that it is 
probable you may find it at the East Station." She 
kindly wrote the words for me on a slip of paper, and 
I, more humble now, showed the paper to the coach- 
man, in place of attempting to pronounce the words. 
In about twenty minutes he landed me at the " Gare 
VEst" Here, again, I had my usual experience. It 
seemed now as though it were the proper thing to have. 
If you asked a man if he spoke English, the right 



150 WANDERINGS IN EUROPE. 

thing for him to do was to stare at you and make no 
reply. But I had a lexicon in my pocket that I had 
not used. It is more than a lexicon; it is something 
that talks. Money talks in Paris. It is a language 
that all Europe understands. The larger the coin, the 
clearer the speech. I made an eloquent address to one 
of the clerks. He was the first man that understood 
me thoroughly. He put what I said in his pocket, and 
led me to another room, where I presented my receipt. 
The clerk there looked over it and spoke to me in 
French. He called up a man who spoke in German. 
He told me that there were eight francs to pay. I 
paid them. He then began a series of questions which 
I managed to answer to his satisfaction. How I 
wished that the doctor had been about, to hear me talk 
German! Then he gave me a paper to sign. I did 
not know what the paper was, but I signed it. Then 
he fired a whole volley of questions at me, which I 
meekly answered. 

Who are you ? " 

Where do you live ? " 

When did you leave home ? " 

What did you leave home for ? " 

What is your business in life ? " 

When did you go to Germany ? " 

What were you doing in Germany?" 

Where did you go to from Germany ? " 



PLAIN QUESTIONS. 151 

" When did you come to Paris ? " 

" Where are you stopping in Paris ? " 

" Why did you come to Paris ? " 

" How long will you stay in Paris ? " 

" Where will you go from Paris ? " 

" What have you in your box ? " 

Then he gave me a paper as large as my receipt, and 
pointed to another window. There I was given 
another paper to sign. I signed it. Then they gave 
me my receipt and pointed to another room. I obeyed, 
and found myself in the presence of a few custom- 
house officials, and many strangers, and a huge pile of 
boxes. I was glad to see the clerk whom I had paid 
for services before, in this room. He motioned for me 
to look up my box. I succeeded in finding it, when 
the fellow pulled it out of the pile, and left it and me 
together. In a few minutes an officer touched me and 
directed with his hand the way to the room I had just 
come from. Here a German-speaking officer wanted 
to know why my name was not Davis. I told him 
because it was Meloy. Doctor Davis' name was on the 
box. He had signed the receipt as owner. This 
involved another talk, and more explanations. The 
officials were satisfied, however, and sent me to my 
box. I opened it, and stood by it. 

I was not so lonesome as I had been. 

There were the soiled linen, and wooden shoes, and 



152 WANDERINGS IN EUROPE. 

other valuables that belonged to us. At last two men 
came along and began to unpack the box for me. 
They opened collar boxes, and peered inside the 
" Dutch " shoes, and ran their dirty hands over shirt 
fronts, crumpled up our dress suits, and then pasted a 
tab on the lid and tried to shut it down. 

It would not shut. 

So they pounded down on the contents with both 
hands, like a woman kneading bread, until the lid was 
closed. I motioned a porter to take it out now, but 
he simply shook his head. After half an hour, during 
which time I stood by the box thinking, he came and 
handed me a paper, and taking the box on his shoulder, 
loaded it on the coach. Then he took a half-franc 
from me, and gave a ticket to the driver and one to 
me. The cabman started, only to be stopped by a 
guard who took the tickets from us, and we were off 
for the hotel. I had been three hours getting through 
the custom house. The doctor had given me up as 
lost, and to his anxious inquiries I replied : 

" I have been talking German to a man at the 
station ! " 

Then he said: " I wish you had been lost ! " 

I have not overdrawn this experience in the least, 
but I have since found out that all persons coming 
from Germany or sending goods from Germany to 
France have trouble. France suspects every man and 



"REVENGE!" 153 

everything that comes from Germany. Had my trunk 
not been sent from Heidelberg, or had I not been able 
to speak German at all, I would have fared better. "A 
little learning is a dangerous thing." The hatred of 
France and Germany is apparent. It runs through 
all classes of people. These nations are preparing for 
war, and sooner or later it will come. The French 
people are not only biding their time, but are prepar- 
ing to regain Alsace and Lorraine. 

Germany is increasing her army in expectancy of a 
struggle, and hence it is that the women must work 
while the men play soldier. It is the misfortune of 
both countries that in the hour of victory a most un- 
generous policy was pursued toward the vanquished. 
Germany points to the ruins left by the victorious 
French, and France, remembering the insults to her 
flag, and the capture of her provinces, says, with 
exceeding bitterness, " Revenge ! " 

You can not pass through these countries without 
having your sympathies awakened on one side or the 
other. Had there only been a Grant commanding the 
German army when Paris was captured, there would 
have been good feeling and lasting peace between the 
two great nations. 

"Keep your horses," said the hero of Vicksburg 
when Richmond fell ; " you will need them for the 
spring plowing ! " 



154 WANDERINGS IN EUROPE, 

Germany did not pursue this policy, and the result 
is a constant dread of, and preparation for war with 
the old foe. 

But the position of England troubles France. Eng- 
land is friendly to Germany, and her intervention must 
be prevented, and therefore France is looking toward 
Russia to say, when the hour comes, " Hands ofi ! " 
With Russia to keep England quiet, the young and 
vigorous republic may be able to take the German 
throat and say, " Give us back Alsace and Lorraine ! " 
These provinces are chafing under the German control, 
and with an ardent love for their country they sing 
their songs in captivity with as much of loyalty as ever 
Israel had when she refused to sing, at the order of her 
rude captors, " By the Rivers of Babylon." 

Just now this feeling is being fanned in Paris by a 
great fete in the Garden of the Tuilleries, which is held 
to raise funds for the poor of the French and Russian 
armies. You will see everywhere the letters " F. R.," 
but occasionally the little character " & " is inserted, 
so that the people, in place of reading " French Repub- 
lic, " read " France & Russia." 

What the result may be, no one can surely predict. 
Had there been no changes made in methods of war- 
fare, Germany would have an easy victory in such a 
conflict; but, under present conditions, where celerity 
and skill are more to be depended on than mere force 



" CHAMPS ELYSEES. " 155 

and numbers, the result may be very different from 
what we would naturally expect. It will be a battle 
between the swift and the strong. 

Paris is a beautiful city, whether seen by day or 
night. A guide is not an absolute necessity. You 
will learn more by personal observation than you will 
by having teachers to solve every difficulty for you 
as soon as it arises. It was with this feeling that we 
determined to see what we wanted to see in Paris 
alone. The first place that we went was to the 
" Champs Ely sees" We must begin at once to pro- 
nounce names properly and to call the streets " rues." 

Champs Elysees — Shauns-a-lee-say, if you please — 
is sought. The coachman knows at once where you 
want to go and what you want to see when you say to 
him, " Champs Elysees." This is the finest part of 
Paris and is esteemed unequaled in the world. It is 
a wide avenue, along the sides of which there are 
pleasure grounds of exceeding beauty. You enter 
this place of delights by the Place de la Concorde, 
and leave it at the western extremity by the Arc de 
Triomphe. The distance is but one mile, but one mile 
of unsurpassed beauty. The wide street is filled with 
carriages and horses splendidly equipped. The avenue 
leads you through a bewildering scene of lovely prome- 
nades and cool, shaded walks, through flower gardens, 
by sparkling fountains, where tens of thousands meet. 



156 WANDERINGS IN EUROPE. 

The scene so rich by day is even more imposing by 
night. Thousands of lamps of colored glass give the 
impression of varied beauty such as one not often sees ; 
music adds its enchantments, and the open pleasure 
gardens bid you enter where concerts are held. The 
words " entre libre " have beguiled many a one to take 
a seat, in the belief that he is for once in his life to 
have a free show. But he is expected to buy some- 
thing to eat or drink, and a simple glass of lemonade 
includes the full price of an admission. 

The concert which we attended was, so far as dress 
and general conduct are concerned, entirely unobjec- 
tionable. Young Parisian damsels, modestly attired, 
sang sweet songs, and young men gave recitations 
which looked amusing. Polite as Parisians are, they 
do not deem it discourteous to talk and laugh while 
someone is entertaining them, unless his entertain- 
ment is more fascinating than their conversation. The 
city throngs these grounds, not to engage in vulgar 
rioting, but in quest of pleasures that certainly are not 
debasing. 

The credit of founding this beautiful pleasure gar- 
den is given to Louis XI Y. Some, however, have given 
the honor to Marie de ? Medici, and fix the date at 
1616. The avenue itself had been laid out bv Marie 
de' Medici in that year. It seems wonderful to one 
accustomed to call that old which dates back half a 



BOIS DE BOULOGNE. 157 

century, to see the beautiful garden substantially as it 
was two and one-half centuries ago. 

The Bois de Boulogne is half a mile beyond the 
Arc de Triomphe, which the reader will remember is 
at the western end of the Champs Sly sees. The pro- 
nunciation here must be learned, or your coachman will 
not have any idea what you mean. You will find it 
convenient to say to him, Bwa-deh-boo-lone. Even 
this place is historic. It is a forest containing twenty- 
live hundred acres. It has been partially destroyed 
several times, so that guns might be trained against 
invading armies. Wellington encamped here, and as 
late as 1870 the Prussians would have used it when at- 
tacking the city; and proud as Paris was of her forest, 
it was cut dow r n. The trees in it are therefore mostly 
small, and the drive through it is lacking in interest. 
The grounds were dusty and the trees parched up with 
the heat. Much of the beauty of any park depends 
on rain, and this had not been given to the forest of 
Paris for some weeks. 

In the evening we attended the fete in the garden of 
the Tuilleries. The garden is much larger than it was 
when the palace was standing. The site of the build- 
ings has been added to the original gardens. Thefete 
was to raise funds for the Russian and French armies. 
As stated before, it was an interesting place to visit. 
Lamps, of many colors, on hundreds of arches, burned 



158 WANDERINGS IN EUROPE. 

during the evening. Altogether there must have been 
thousands of these lamps, and they were arranged in 
so many different forms that it seemed as though 
special artists had been engaged to put them in place. 
The lamps were simply little cups filled with some 
oily substance in which were dipped wicks that burned 
down to the surface of the oil. Inside this inclosure 
there were fireworks^ merry-go-rounds, toboggan cars, 
shows, acrobatic performances, concerts, and various 
kinds of games to attract a penny from the patron. 

One fellow interested me. He had a maul in his 
hands and was bantering passers-by to come and make 
a trial of their strength with him. A tube stood about 
fifteen feet high, and in this tube, resting on a spring, 
was the figure of a handsome lady. If the man had 
sufficient muscle to give a blow of a certain force, the 
female figure sprang to the top of the tube and bowed; 
but if he was not able to strike hard enough, she refused 
to appear. 

In some respects the great fete was not unlike a 
country fair, and within the gates the populace gath- 
ered by tens of thousands to enjoy the amusements 
that were afforded them. How different the scene 
presented here from what has so often been witnessed 
on this very ground ! The shout of the warrior was 
heard here; the ground was red with blood ; it was cov- 
ered with the wounded and the dying ; victims by the 



PARIS ON THE CROSS. 159 

hundred perished here by the blade of the guillotine. 
Here, too, royalty once reigned and deemed itself se- 
cure ; here, amid horrors which no pen can ever pict- 
ure, trie Commune went down, and in due time the 
reign of law and order was established. But it was 
during the dark days of communistic reign in Paris, 
between the 18th of March and the 27th of May, 1871, 
that the most terrible scenes ever enacted in human 
history occurred . " Then it was," says Victor Hugo, 
" that Paris was nailed upon the cross for the sins of 
the whole world." But if we carry out this figure, 
the Golgotha was the garden of the Tuilleries. 

In no other place do we come in such close contact 
with the struggles of earth. In no other city did the 
fire-engines throw streams of petroleum to drench 
buildings that were to be burned. Can it be possible 
that these gay gardens ever witnessed such horrid 
cruelties ? I recall a little sad history/ It dates to 
this very month of August, and to this very day- 
August 24, 1572. The houses of Catholics were 
illuminated that night, not only to designate their 
location, but to aid in the work of blood, as the cruel 
orders that came from the heart of the guilty and 
crafty and venomous Catherine de' Medici were exe- 
cuted. Let us turn away from the scene of all this 
gaiety, for the blood-red lamps, in the light of which 
the thoughtless peoples chatter, remind me too 



160 WANDERINGS IN EUROPE. 

much of the blood of thousands who were slain by the 
hands of cruelty in this vicinity. 

It was late Saturday night when we reached the 
hotel, and there came up in my mind a hundred half- 
forgotten facts of history, mingled with the memory 
of the gay crowds that were assembled in the garden, 
and I wondered why it is that the progress of the 
nations to a higher form of political freedom has so 
often been marked by blood. May it not be that the 
crimson garments have been rolled up forever by the 
angels of peace, and the sway of Him will soon come 
of the increase of whose government and peace there 
shall be no end ? It seems as though in Paris I can 
realize a day of unclouded glory rising after the dark 
night— -a day in which the songs of good- will and frater- 
nity shall be heard after the night whose darkness was 
pierced by the light of the torch in incendiary hands, 
and whose hours that should have been still were 
disturbed by the cries of the terror-stricken and the 
dying. 

There is already a mighty transformation wrought 
in this wonderful city, and the wish of my heart is 
expressed in the words that you will so often see on 
halls and monuments, and that are so often heard as 
the children express their love and loyalty, " Vive 
la Republique ! " 




CHAPTER XI. 

HE little American church was well filled 
on Sabbath morning, and a sermon full of 
good thought was preached. In the even- 
ing we sought out the McAll mission, and 
to our surprise found some two dozen strangers 
trying to get in. At last, when .the number 
waiting outside had considerably increased, we were 
told that there was to be no service there that evening, 
on account of the extreme heat. Our enthusiasm for 
the mission and our hopes of its success went down 
together. 

Paris is a notoriously Roman Catholic city. If any 
one had doubts of this before, he would have been fully 
persuaded on Monday, which was Assumption Day, 
and is kept by the church. Four-fifths of the stores 
were closed, either because the proprietors were 
Catholics, or because they did not want to antagonize 
the feelings of so many of their own citizens. And 
yet I noticed that places of entertainment were open 

as usual. 

11 (161) 



162 WANDERINGS IN EUROPE. 

Paris is no worse than Chicago. Sabbath in Amer- 
ica is as much profaned as the Parisian Sunday. There 
were grave hints of immoral performances which 
might be seen, but I had not the least desire to look 
on the darkest side of human depravity, where the 
sight would be productive of no possible good. Nor 
could I say that Paris by day, or in the early evening, 
is a city given to drunkenness. Nearly all Paris drinks. 
The wines are light and the men and women who im- 
bibe are able to stand up after taking them; but it 
does not follow that no evil is done. The moral sense 
may be corrupted and the spiritual life sullied where 
there has been no bestial intoxication. The effects of 
this moderate drinking may be seen at a later hour and 
in the lowest parts of the city. When respectability 
has put out the lights and retired to rest, the young and 
old, who once quaffed lighter wines, begin their hate- 
ful revels, and down the dark lanes and rows sin holds 
high carnival, and hell demands her impure orgies. It 
is an unwilling comment that I make on the habits of 
many Americans who visit the East, that they fall so 
readily into the customs of the people. No high 
standard of morality is maintained, and the youth who 
accompany the parents, go home to live as their parents 
did in Europe. Even ministers of the gospel, who 
have been sent abroad, followed by the prayers of 
their people, have been known to acquire habits while 



MADNESS OF THE COMMUNE. 163 

away which have destroyed their subsequent useful- 
ness, and blighted their whole lives. 

The great Yendome column is easily recognized by 
the pictures of it that have been scattered throughout 
the world. It was erected by Napoleon I. in 1806, 
as a monument to his greatness and the bravery of the 
French army in the wars against Prussia. This col- 
umn stands in the Place Yendome, and is one hundred 
and forty-four feet high. The heart of the column is 
of masonry, and the outside is a series of bronze 
plates, representing different battle scenes. There are 
nine hundred feet of these reliefs, and the visitor will 
never have sufficient time to study them all. To 
make the column more impressive, it was, in part, con- 
structed of captured cannon, and twelve hundred of 
these were used for this purpose. On the top of this 
column was a statue of Napoleon I. 

Here, in 1871, the fury of the mob was exhibited. 
The Commune looked on this as a monument to the 
triumphs of royalty, and determined to destroy it. 

A most interesting description of their efforts in 
this direction is found in a valuable work, by my 
gifted friend, Mr. John McGovern, "The Empire of 
Information." " The ceremony of pulling down the 
Column Yendome was announced for Monday after. 
noon. The crowd to witness this act of official 
vandalism was very great. The widest diversity of 



164 WANDERINGS IN EUROPE. 

apprehension was felt as to the result of the shock in 
falling of the enormous mass of metal and brick. Some 
thought the street would be crushed through to the 
sewers. Others believed that all the loaded balco- 
nies of the neighborhood would fall. Again, others 
dreaded seeing the old houses in the vicinity topple 
and go to pieces. An enormous mass of manure, saw- 
dust, and sand, had been prepared as a bed for the 
fallen monument, and the ordinary apparatus for mov- 
ing a house was fixed in the street, a block or so 
away. The rope from the capstan led to the top of 
the column. The base had been greatly weakened. 
The final act was delayed by the operations of two 
men, at the summit of the monument, trying to 
fasten the flag of France in the hands of the bronze 
figure. The tri-color, after many attempts of the 
men, was fixed in place, and the populace at once 
perceived that the Commune would be satisfied with 
nothing short of this insult to the glorious banner of 
their country. Just as the word was to be given for 
the closing operation a wind sprang up, and detached 
the flag from the hand of the bronze Napoleon. The 
hour was late. The flag must be insulted. The cere- 
mony was postponed until the next day. The fol- 
lowing day other things happened to hinder the out- 
rage against art and history, but the people now began 
to revile the leaders of the Commune for their failure. 



THE STORY OF BLOOD. 165 

This led to redoubled energy, and just before dark, as 
the jeering crowd began to adjourn, in contempt of 
the unscientific destructiveness of the Commune, the 
column was seen to totter. It fell a moment after- 
ward, and the emblem of France's empire over 
nearly the whole world was no more." 

But when the banner of France fell in the heap of 
filth, a shudder of indignation ran through the hearts 
of many thousands, that presaged the end of the mad 
Commune. The column has since been replaced, and 
is regarded with a feeling akin to veneration by the 
people, and with abiding interest by the stranger. 
But let us away, where we may not hear. the story of 
blood, if such a place can be found in Paris. We will 
go to the Jardin des Plantes, and there get rid of the 
records of war. But the attempt is vain. In this 
wonderful garden, where you find galleries of geology, 
and botany, and anatomy, you will also find a vast 
menagerie. While you go from one part of this to 
another, you are reminded of the days of the siege, 
and of the fact that many of the animals of the garden 
were eaten by the people to satisfy their hunger. 

Where, then, shall we go ? The church is a sanctu- 
ary and was once a refuge. The blood that is spoken 
of there ought to be the blood of sacrifice alone. Near 
our hotel is Saint Koch's. It is not a pretentious 
building, but .services are being held in it. The music 



166 WANDERINGS IN EUROPE. 

is the finest in Paris. I entered and listened for a while 
to the music, and presume that it was as represented, 
but there are degrees in this art so far beyond me that 
I fail to recognize their excellence. 

What of Saint Koch's ? In front of this church, a 
century ago, Napoleon planted his cannon to preserve 
the peace of the city. It is located on the Rue St. 
Honore, and surely there is no place in the world 
where strife has been more determined. 

I hasten to the church of the Madeleine. There is 
something in the name that tells of mercy and pardon. 
This church is modeled after the Parthenon, at Athens. 
It is fifty-four feet in height, three hundred and fifty 
feet long and one hundred and forty feet wide. No 
services are being held here, but workmen are busy 
putting an effigy in place, and others erecting a statue 
of some saint. It is a place frequented by all stran- 
gers. A great flight of stone steps leads up to the front 
entrance. These steps extend nearly the entire width 
of the building. Here, at last, I have gotten away 
from the sad sacrifices that man made of his brother ! 
But it must have been near this that the fierce strug- 
gles of the Commune raged. The church is near the 
Place de la Concorde. Within these walls three hun- 
dred men, who had fled before the army of France, 
took refuge. These aisles, where so many Catholic 
knees have bent, were crimsoned with the blood of the 



BLOTTING OUT THE SABBATH. 167 

fugitives. They came with red hands to the church 
for refuge, and not one of them escaped. A citizen 
had revealed their hiding place. The great stone steps 
were burdened with the dying. It is not a figure of 
speech, but a truth of history, that the streets of Paris 
were red with the blood of the slain. 

It is not my purpose to write a history of this crime 
against history, and against humanity, but there is 
something, in view of the present tendency to secular- 
ism in our own country, that will be of particular 
interest, and to this my attention has been directed by 
reading the excellent work quoted from a little while 
ago. It refers to the calendar adopted by the French 
in 1793. The years and months were to be divided on 
" philosophical principles." The Christian Era was to 
be abolished, and the date of reckoning was to be from 
the formation of the Republic, dating at the time of 
the autumnal equinox — September 22, 1792, The 
seasons were to be autumn, winter, spring, and 
summer. The first month of each period was called 
Vindemaire, or the month of vintage ; Nivose, or the 
month of snow ; Germinal, or the month of buds, and 
Messidor, the harvest month. Each tenth day was to 
be a day of rest, and the Sabbath was to be forever 
obliterated. The attempt of France to do away with 
the institutions of Divine appointment ought to serve 
as a warning to the Republic of America. 



168 WANDERINGS IN EUROPE. 

Notre Dame in many respects disappointed me. It 
was founded in 1163, where once a temple to Jupiter 
stood. The cultured idolatry of its worship is a step 
in advance of the services that were rendered in the 
heathen temple, but there are many longer strides to 
be taken before its services will conform to the 
simplicity of New Testament worship. For a con- 
sideration, you will be shown a thorn, which, it is 
claimed, was taken from the crown worn by the Savior, 
and also a piece of the cross to which he was nailed. I 
suppose that it would be difficult to prove that these 
are not what they are represented to be, and even 
harder to establish the claim that they are. But they 
are held in high veneration, and if one have sufficient 
credulity they will do him quite as much good as 
though their genuineness were fully established. But 
I am too much of a doubter to enjoy relics that may 
have so many rivals in the field. The old plum tree 
in New York City that marked the corner of the 
Bowery affords an illustration of what I mean. Pieces 
of the original tree are shown along the North River so 
numerously that the tree must have been immense, and 
furnished tons of plums, and several cords of wood. 

The interior is filled partly with the statues of kings 
and saints, and pictures of judgment, in which I take 
not the least interest. But the windows are worth 
studying, at least in an artistic way. 



A MODEL OF BEAUTY. 169 

The great rose window, forty-two feet in diameter, is 
the handsomest work I have ever seen ; and if you will 
get a view of this from the farther end of the cathedral 
it will be a picture that will always live in memory. 

But of all cathedrals that I have seen, Sainte Cha- 
pelle is the fairest. It dates to about the middle of the 
thirteenth century, and was built to hold the relics 
brought back by the Crusaders from Palestine. Its 
architecture is very peculiar, being narrow in propor- 
tion to its length and height. It is one hundred and 
fifteen feet long, thirty-nine feet wide, and one hun- 
dred and fifteen feet high. Its windows, which occupy 
the greater part of the sides of the structure, are forty- 
eight feet high, and are of richly-colored glass, The 
structure is regarded, and I think rightly, as the finest 
specimen of Gothic art to be found anywhere in France. 
There are no gloomy walls, and dull pictures, and 
heavy columns, to oppress you, but all is light and 
inviting as a crystal palace could be, yet without any 
glare to dazzle and bewilder. High, slender columns, 
with their delicate capitals, support graceful arches 
above you. When I had seen this splendid structure, 
I did not care to look at any other in France, prefer- 
ring that this last impression should be left me as 
that which is unrivaled in church architecture. 

What is now the Pantheon was originally the church 
of Saint Genevieve, erected in the sixth century. It 



170 WANDERINGS IN EUROPE. 

was, however, neglected, notwithstanding the fact that 
it was built over the bones of Saint Genevieve, the 
protectress of Paris. Madame de Pompadour set her 
heart on rebuilding it, and Louis XV. laid the corner 
stone in 1764. It occupies a commanding position, and 
now wholly given over to secularism, is a curiosity. 

A look at the dome will please you, but it must 
be taken at the expense of one's neck, for there 
are no appliances of mirrors or lounges to enable you 
to look up without some difficulty. It was decorated 
by Gros, and represents kings of France doing homage 
to Genevieve. Two hundred and fifty columns are in 
and around the building. We visited the vaults 
underneath, not to see where the bodies of Marat and 
Mirabeau had been, but to look on the casket that 
once contained the body of Victor Hugo, and to see 
his sarcophagus. It was a surprise, but one that gave 
me great pleasure, to notice fastened to one of the sil- 
ver handles of the casket a small silk flag — the stars 
and stripes. In this building the Commune had placed 
powder, intending to add to their other acts of vandal- 
ism the destruction of the Pantheon, but the army 
prevented the execution of the plot. 

It is a fitting place for the ashes of Hugo to rest. 
He was a patriot in sympathy with the Commune's 
desire to fight the enemies of France, yet opposing 
the madness of the mob. No pen was ever held in 



NAPOLEONS TOMB. 171 

human hands that had more wonderful powers of 
description than his. It is proper that if cathedrals are 
to be cemeteries, they should at least not have within 
their vaults the bodies of men who were not noted for 
their piety or grace. 

We leave the Pantheon and are driven to the Dome 
des InvalideS) where is the tomb of the great Napo- 
leon. ISTapoleon died in exile, May 5, 1821. The 
body was brought to Paris by the way of the Bois de 
Boulogne, beneath the Arch of Triumph, and to its 
present resting place, December 15, 1840. 

The red granite sarcophagus weighs sixty -seven tons, 
and cost two thousand eight hundred dollars. Around 
this sarcophagus are statues of victory, and in the 
mosaic pavement a beautiful wreath. Above the door 
of the crypt is a sentence taken from his will : 

Je desire que mes eendres reposent stir les bords 
de la Seine au milieu de ce peuple Frangais que 
fai taut aime. 

"I desire that my ashes may repose upon the banks 
of the Seine, in the midst of the French people, whom 
I have ever loved," 

The words have a sad sort of melody in them, 
especially when we remember that he was by birth a 
Corsican, and that his heart had been broken by ban- 
ishment, as the waves were broken on the rocks of 



172 WANDERINGS IN EUROPE. 

Saint Helena. But the sorrows of his exile had 
softened his nature. 

The Garden of the Luxembourg was a disappoint- 
ment. It may have been so because we visited it in 
the dry season of the year. It was early in August, 
but the lawns were without greenness, and that is 
to be without beauty. We strolled under trees which 
had been robbed of their foliage by the drought. We 
walked along paths where the dead leaves had not 
been swept up. An American forest, burning with 
gold when the frosts have touched it, is even fairer 
than the rich verdure of the early spring-time ; but, Oh, 
the dreariness of a park with dead leaves all about 
you ! The flower garden was inviting, yet it showed 
the effects of hot and dry weather. Near it is the 
place where many of the communists were executed 
in 1871. 

How thankful I was that the attempt to burn the 
Louvre was a failure ! It is the most interesting place 
in Paris, if not in the world. As we pass through its 
galleries, devoted to art, it is hard for us to realize 
that these very halls (in the oUer part) were the 
residences of royalty, and that in them there was the 
most fiendish plot devised that ever came to a cruel 
nature. It is enough to say that the palace was 
occupied by Catherine de' Medici, and her son, Charles 
IX., who but too willingly obeyed the mandates of 



ROYALTY NEEDS ROOM TO BREATHE. 173 

his wicked mother. It was from this palace that the 
order was given for the massacre of Saint Bartholo- 
mew's. But a little distance away is the church from 
the tower of which the signal bell was rung. This 
palace, and that of the Tuilleries, occupied twenty-four 
acres. Royalty needed room to breathe. And yet, so 
infatuated were the rulers of France with their 
brief authority, that they must also have palaces at 
Versailles. 




CHAPTEK XII. 

HE Louvre is given up to art, and who that 
has stood before the sweet sculptured face of 
"Venus de Milo," or examined the wonders 
of the brush in the hands of masters in 
their art, could suggest a better purpose to which 
the palaces of kings could be put ? There is a 
gem room in the Louvre which all who have but lim- 
ited time ought to inspect with greatest care. It will 
do to wander through the other parts of the building, 
where there is enough to engage your attention for 
years, had you the time, but in this small room you 
surely may spend many hours with profit and delight. 
It is interesting to study the art of Fra Angelica, 
who knew nothing whatever of perspective, and whose 
paintings are as flat as blue and white dinner plates; 
but if the soul is to be enlarged, it must be in studies 
of more recent works. In this room, Salon Carre, are 
clustered together the gems of the Louvre. A single 
painting of Murillo, which some conceited fellow was 
ostentatiously copying (?), was purchased in 1852 at a 

cost of $120,000. 

(174) 



VANITY OF ARTISTS. 175 

The great artists had their weaknesses and attempted 
to immortalize themselves by painting their own por- 
traits among the figures of the scene. It must be said, 
however, that they did not always give their features 
to the one performing the most exalted service, as in 
the "Marriage at Cana," by Paul Veronese. The artist 
made exact portraits of his fellows, and gave them all 
places in the orchestra. Titian has a bass-viol ; Bas- 
sano holds a flute ; Paul Yeronese, dressed in white, 
has a viol ; and Tintoretto also holds a viol. 

I always supposed that the author somehow man- 
aged to get himself in his book, but was ignorant of 
the fact that the artist actually produced his own like- 
ness on the canvas. How hard it is for us to get 
away from ourselves ! We reap what we have sown, 
but the harvest we gather in, like the reaper, has 
grown into the likeness of the seed. 

Yet, who was Paul Veronese? His very name is 
obscured by his greatness. His name was Cagliari. 
But he became such a universal favorite that he took 
the name of the city in which he was born, Verona, 
and was known as Paul Veronese. The honor totally 
obscured the man, and not one in a thousand who 
looks on his works has the least conception of his true 
name. His pictures are full of what in literature 
would be anachronisms, and he seemed to delight in 
doing violence to the proprieties of time and country. 



176 WANDERINGS IN EUROPE. 

But his greatness is seen in the fact that his works 
rose superior to his errors. 

Rubens must have been an artless man, while a 
model artist. It is sometimes esteemed a weakness 
for a man to talk much of his wife, in the belief that 
her noble qualities will speak for themselves, and it 
is specially esteemed indelicate for him to talk much 
of his first wife in the presence of his second. Rubens 
talked in his pictures of his first wife, utterly regard- 
less of the criticisms of the world, and of his second 
wife. Her fair face and red mantle appear in every 
painting where it is possible to bring forth a noble 
character. This appears much nobler than the work 
of the artist, Palma the Younger, who paints the judg- 
ment scene, and among those on the left hand, who 
are being consigned to their terrible doom, is to be 
found the picture of his wife. How a man could 
mingle fine colors, who had such an unrefined nature, 
it is difficult to tell. " One may smile and be a vil- 
lain," and I suppose that one may paint without being 
desperately in love with his wife ; but we may rightly 
expect nothing very refined from a coarse nature. 

I have also been surprised at the work that these 
artists have done, as to its quantity as well as quality. 
It is said that they worked for eternity, and if so, they 
surely were not idlers. How could one man do so 
much \ To Rubens there are ascribed eighteen hundred 



LIVES CONSUMED. 177 

paintings, many of them large. It has been estimated 
that every week in which he was engaged in his 
art he must have produced a picture. But it is prob- 
able that many of them were made by others under 
his direction. Admitting this, every one of them 
bears the stamp of his genius. 

The orator gives out with every sentence he utters 
something of his life to his hearers, and the artist gives 
something of his life to the canvas. Every touch of 
the brush has in it a fine frenzy, a loving ardor, a 
glowing devotion, that must, like a burning flame, con- 
sume the life. The artist obtained promotion ; he 
secured the crown; he lives in the conceptions of his 
brain, and the work of his hand, but he paid the full 
price, and paid it in advance. Shall the one who 
speaks to the soul by the harmony of eternal truth have 
less Zealand more of murmuring than they had who 
spoke through the colors and shadings made by the 
brush ? 

Art ennobles, and nature gives rest, only where there 
is truth. Pictures may tell the most egregious lies, 
and a cartoon may be guilty of the basest slanders. It 
is no wonder that the wise critic should advise his 
friend to " utter nothing regard lessly," but that friend 
spoke through pictures. 

Versailles is only ten miles by rail from Paris. The 

booking agent is a lady, who no doubt speaks beautiful 
12 



178 WANDERINGS IN EUROPE. 

French, but not a word of English. I had, how- 
ever, learned the universal language of pantomime to 
such perfection that one would have mistaken me for 
a mute. 

One evening, for example, an Italian peasant girl 
entered our compartment, carrying a pet chicken. I 
told the doctor that I proposed having a talk with her 
about her chicken. The doctor looked reprovingly at 
me. He expected that I would insist on using my 
favorite German. His rebuke only made me more 
determined in my attempt ; so I began by laying down 
my thumb near the chicken's head, and then, making 
an imaginary axe of my hand, struck the thumb a blow ; 
that was the first act. The second was to go through 
the process of picking the feathers from an imaginary 
chicken, and after this, and the singeing process, and 
the potting of the fowl, I represented the act of eat- 
ing. It took a good while to act it all out, and w r ould 
be rather an expensive way of talking, if time were of 
any value. It is easy when you have done this to 
turn the head just a little to one side, with a sort of 
inquisitive jerk, and you have the question. She 
guessed my charade at once, and, taking the chicken 
to her arms, shook her head, and stroked the feathered 
fowl very tenderly. Then she answered, in w T ords, as 
much as to say, " I know by your looks that you are 
a preacher, and fond of fowl, but no clergyman shall 



BUYING TICKETS. 179 

ever eat my chicken." She held it in her arms after 
that, as closely as a mother would her child in the 
presence of a cannibal. 

How will I buy tickets from an agent to Versailles? 
The agent does not care to have you act out a long 
charade, in order to sell a ten-mile ticket. I had 
learned to pronounce the name " VersiP 

I held up two fingers and said, " Versi ! " then threw 
down some money, making sure that it was enough. 

She asked me something, which may have been 
how old I was, but I guessed (all Americans say, " I 
guess* 5 ) — no matter, "I guessed" this time that she 
wanted to know about a return ticket. I shook my 
head, which is the universal language for ■ " ISTo, I thank 
you." Then we climbed to the top of an observation 
car and were off. 

Versailles was only a hunting ground in the time 
of Louis XIII. It was, however, enlarged and made 
palatial, and became the royal residence during the 
reign of Louis XIV., who built another palace, some 
distance from the first one, which he called the Grand 
Trianon. Louis XV. built, near this, another smaller 
palace, called the Petit Trianon. These several 
palaces were occupied by the crown until the time 
of the revolution. 

I used to think that a nation that was cursed with a 
king had only to keep up one palace ; but a small 



180 WANDERINGS IN EUROPE. 

kingdom may have a dozen palaces, or even more ; and 
the visits of the king or queen to these palaces is 
remembered as a notable event in history. If I had not 
seen any other palaces, I would by these alone have 
been reminded of the warning that the patriot of Israel 
gave to the people when they proposed taking on airs 
so as to be like the nations about them. It may suit 
the ideas of people who want to live like their neigh- 
bors to have royal rulers, but it involves a large pay- 
ment for the luxury. People are willing, even in 
America, to pay for the honors that someone else may 
carry. These palaces, however, have in France been 
turned into splendid national museums. The number 
and extent of them can hardly be realized by one who 
has not gone through the greater and smaller galleries. 
The large palace at Versailles has in it one hundred 
and nine rooms devoted now to art. 

Looking from the windows of this palace, the view 
is one that bewilders you with the vastness of the gar- 
dens, where you may see flowers blooming by the banks 
of artificial lakes, evergreens trimmed in different 
shapes, and many pieces of statuary. Here are fount- 
ains that used to play at an expense of two thousand 
dollars a day. They are not often active now, but 
royalty did not care for the cost, just so that it might 
be entertained. 

The rooms of the great palace are filled with costly 



TREASURES OF THE TRIANON. 181 

paintings, representing the glory of the French arms. 
The figure of Napoleon I. is everywhere present. The 
thrill of pleasure that I experienced in visiting the 
Pantheon is redoubled here, as I look on portraits of 
Washington and LaFayette. We do not forget the 
name that is thus closely associated with that of Wash- 
ington, and recall once more the visit of LaFayette. 
with his young son, George Washington LaFayette, to 
America, who, when he saw the sarcophagus at Mount 
Vernon, fell on his knees and kissed it. The memory 
of the services of France to the cause of our liberty 
endears the French people to us. 

The Grand Trianon is one mile from Versailles, and 
was erected by Louis XIY. as a sort of quiet resting 
place. But uneasy rests the head that wears a crown, 
and the King soon grew weary of it. As you have 
seen the palace at Versailles, you realize that this one 
was not needed. But now, certainly, having been at the 
Louvre and this palace, you have exhausted the art 
treasures of France. Enter the Trianon and be taught 
a new lesson, as you pass through salons, and dining- 
rooms, and circular salons, and grand galleries, and 
library-rooms, and billiard-rooms, and sleeping-rooms, 
and private rooms, and reception-rooms, and vesti- 
bules, the walls of which are covered with famous 
paintings, and the ceilings ornamented at a fabulous 
outlay of time and genius and money. At last you 



182 WANDERINGS IN EUROPE. 

are glad to get out and breathe the pure air of heaven, 
under a canopy that no human artist has ever had the 
power to ornament. 

Still more of the old idolatry of royalty you can see 
near this in the If usee des Voitures, where there is a 
collection of state carriages. These are great lumber- 
ing coaches, heavily bedecked with gold. The hubs 
and spokes of the wheels, the axles and parts of the 
body of the coach, are burdened with gold. They 
remind one of the circus wagon that excited so much 
interest on the village streets in our childhood. 

" The King used this one on a certain occasion," " the 
Queen rode in that one," " the Pope was offered a seat 
in this one," " the royal baby was taken to the christen- 
ing in that one," etc. I do not care to remember what 
they were all used for. I am not much of a royalist, 
and am sure that better men and women have taken 
far sweeter and brighter babies to be baptized in some 
country school-house, traveling in road-wagons or 
ox-carts. 

But we come to the little palace — Petit Trianon — 
with greater interest. This palace Louis XVI. 
gave to Marie Antoinette. Here the King and Queen 
played rulers, and a sad and tragical play they made of 
it. The Empress Eugenie collected many of the 
belongings of Marie Antoinette and arranged them in 
the rooms of the Petit Trianon, where we saw them. 



"VOLEURS!" 183 

Her bed, and lamp, and jewe'-case, and work stand, 
and pictures, reveal the exquisite taste of one over 
whose life aspersions were east and sorrows rested. 
Let us draw over it the cloak of charity. 

We pass out through the gates down to the little 
stream, where these rulers, who ought to have been car- 
ing for France, played miller and dairy-maid, while the 
people hungered for bread. By the spring-house wall 
is the statue of the shepherd, made by the Queen's 
order, standing there to-day as a monument to her 
folly. 

A soldier accompanies us, for it is necessary to guard 
the treasures of the park, as well as the palace. He 
pointed out an old willow tree, saying that Marie 
Antoinette had planted it with her own hands. 
Several of our party took out their knives and began 
to hew it down for relics. I asked a lady, who spoke 
both French and English, for the word for " thieves." 
She told me, "voleurs" and I immediately shouted it 
to the soldier. He looked at me, and I pointed to the 
tree. The doctor was there. I would now have my 
revenge for all the reproofs he had given me. He 
would be arrested, and I would pay his fine to get him 
released, and then would make him promise obedience 
to me forever. 

The soldier, smiling, went on. I shouted " Voleures /" 
but this time he did not even look back. I shouted 



184 WANDERINGS IN EUROPE. 

" Voleurs ! " the third time; but he had no mercy, and 
would not arrest the party. The doctor came up and 
offered me a chip, which I put away. Then I told him 
that Marie Antoinette had never planted the tree at all; 
it was a trick of the soldiers who had to keep the park 
in order, to get American travelers to clear away the 
old trees for them, and that as soon as they had this 
one cut up, he would show them another ! The doctor, 
however, asserted that the soldier was so much amused 
at an Irishman trying to talk French, that he could 
not have collected himself to arrest them if they had 
been carrying away the whole place. Then I asked 
him why it was that he and the other wood-carvers all 
got behind the tree when I called. The case was 
getting desperate, and in my disappointment at not 
having him arrested I was not willing to be trifled 
with. He answered that they had all been so much 
ashamed of me they had gone behind the tree to hide 
their blushes ! Then I felt sure that he was getting 
jealous of my French accent. 

But shall we turn to a dark page in history ? Re- 
trace your steps to the palace at Versailles. The 
road will lead you along the borders of lakelets and 
by great flower-beds, which are to-day as bright as they 
were in 1789. Enter once more the splendid struct- 
ure. It is not far in life between a smile and a tear ; 



NOT AN IDOL NOW. 185 

between the mill and dairy and the guillotine, but a 
few months may intervene. 

On October 5, 1789, a mob is formed in Paris, 
many of whom are women, driven mad by hunger 
and by liquor. This mob marches all the way from 
Paris to Versailles and surrounds the royal palace with 
cries of " bread ! " and " vengeance ! " 

Here is the window where the beautiful Queen 
appears before the mob. She has ruled the people 
before by her queenly presence and beauty. She 
will appear again, and with a single wave of her hand 
calm the raging billows of popular wrath, even as the 
Savior calmed the waves of troubled Galilee. They 
are howling like maddened wolves about the window ; 
but she has excited their applause ; she has been their 
idol ; she will be their idol still ! Surely they have 
not forgotten her gracious acts; the pardon which 
she extended to an officer, with the words, "The 
Queen does not remember the quarrel, and the officer 
should not recollect what she has forgotten." 

The people surely have not forgotten the taxes she 
has remitted, the hospitals she has builded for the 
poor, the cottages she has erected for the humble and 
lowly. But the people who form this mob have suf- 
fered much from misrule, and the long march from the 
city has not lessened their fury. The Queen goes to 
the window ; but a raging, seething sea of hate boils 



186 WANDERINGS IN EUROPE. 

before her, at the sight of which her face is blanched. 
The mob forces an entrance to the palace. A guard 
steps to the hallway, and shouting, " Save the Queen ! " 
resists the progress of the people. He is slain in 
the doorway, and his blood crimsons the floor of the 
palace. Another guard takes his place and gives his 
life for the Queen. I saw the secret door and stairway 
by which she flees. At last the guards drive the mob 
from the palace. Some time the next day she again is 
forced to appear before the people, now only held back 
by the power of arms. The mob is sullen as before. 
Her power is gone, and she stands pale and trembling 
before the enraged and hungry throng. A man, whose 
name sends a thrill of devotion through every true 
American heart, uses his power to exorcise the demon 
of evil from the multitude before him. He stands by 
the Queen, whom they refuse to recognize. They 
would honor him, but they hate her. He takes her 
fair, white hand in his, and partly lifting it, and partly 
bowing to it, presses it to his lips. 

A shout of joy arises ! The demon of hate is gone ! 
That one act of devotion to his Queen touches a 
chord in the fickle heart of the French that quickly 
responds to his desires. 

La Fayette kisses the hand of Marie Antoinette. 

The billows of wrath roll away, and the people 
shout praises in place of curses. But now a demand 



ROYALTY IN RAGS. 187 

comes. The King and Queen of France must live in 
their palace, among the people in Paris. The proces- 
sio 1 is formed and the royal residence is taken up in 
the palace of the Tuilleries. The rest of that short, sad 
story is too well known. Let us reenter Paris and 
now visit the old city prison. It is not easy to gain 
admittance, but it is possible. I stand in the low, 
damp, narrow cell, where she who came to France 
when a child of sixteen, and who began her reign as the 
popular idol, was imprisoned. The same bars are on 
the little window ; the same crucifix, before which she 
bowed, is on the wall ; the same old-fashioned lamp, 
where the smoking flax gave forth a sickly flame, is 
above you. Here she sat knitting a garter for a friend. 

She may have been a foolish queen, but she was a 
noble prisoner. Her shoes were soaked with water, 
and her dress was in tatters, but she uttered no com- 
plaint. If she had been a thoughtless queen, these chill 
walls, could they only speak, would tell a story of peni- 
tence that must have been heard by Him who said 
" Neither do I condemn thee ; go and sin no more." 

Out of the darkness there comes light. There is a 
God in history, because there is a God in providence. 
The Revolution was a necessity. 

Let us look once more at the " Lion of Lucerne," 
carved in the rock, protecting the lily with his paw, 
while a broken spear transfixes his heart, and deem it 



188 WANDERINGS IN EUROPE. 

not unmanly to drop a tear for the brave and also for 
the erring. The lion commemorates the bravery of the 
Swiss guard, every man of which fell defending the 
Tuilleries. Louis XYI. was tried and condemned for 
treason and was guillotined on January 25, 1793. 
On October 14th, Marie Antoinette was summoned 
before the tribunal at two o'clock in the morning. 
Her trial was one to bring the blush of shame to 
the most hardened cheeks. Justice was mocked, and 
civility, not to say decency, was outraged; yet she 
was calm and dignified, exhibiting in the highest 
degree the qualities of a true queen— a true woman. 
The day following her trial she was led to the guillo- 
tine. She arrayed herself in pure white linen, care- 
fully arranged her hair, and with her arms bound 
behind her back was taken to the Place de la Revolu- 
tion. Misfortune, detraction, and sorrow had subdued 
her nature and added to her better qualities a peculiar 
charm, It was easy for her to be calm when seated 
on the throne, but it was noble to be courteous and 
self-possessed when she ascended the scaffold. The 
knife descended, and she was with an impartial Judge, 
while the Revolution, in the language of Lamartine, 
was " irretrievably disgraced." 

Paris has not disappointed me in the vastness of its 
buildings, the beauty of its boulevards, the displays of 
art, the wealth of its historical associations, nor in the 



NEEDS A SHOWER OF BAIN. 189 

generous policy of its government. I am told that a 
cool breeze or a shower of rain would have given fresh- 
ness to that which seemed dull and without life. Yet 
as I recall the city I am forced to admit its beauty, not- 
withstanding its dust and drought. It is a city that has 
done much to preserve what is fairest in art, and the 
time may come when the same bell that rang out the 
order for massacre shall call together a people who 
will worship God in the sweet simplicity of an intel- 
ligent faith. 

The French are a great people. They have displayed 
an energy in rising after defeat that astonishes the 
world. They are both watchful and courageous, warm 
in friendship, swift in battle, and terrible in resent- 
ment. The little children sit in the schools of patriot- 
ism and are taught to say, " La belle France" In any 
possible conflict that may arise with the church or with 
a foreign foe, the French people would send up a 
mighty shout that would echo from the Pyrenees to 
the Straits, " Vive la Bej>ublique ! " She is happy and 
contented as a republic, and will not return to a kingly 
form of government while enjoying her present pros- 
perity. The old palaces and coin and monuments will 
be all the relics of royalty she desires, and these do not 
deplete her treasury. The site of the Tuilleries has 
become a garden for the people, and the children of 
poverty can play where monarchs sat enthroned. 




CHAPTER XIII. 



^ HERE is very little to interest one on the 
^ way from Paris to London, unless it is 



when crossing the straits. When we 
neared Calais, I thought of Beau Brurnmel, 
who was forced to flee from London to avoid 
the payment of his debts, and who, thus cast out 
of fashionable society, remarked that u Any man ought 
to be contented who could spend his time between 
Paris and London." Almost unconsciously, I put my 
hand to my neck-tie, to know that it was in proper posi- 
tion, and felt glad that this man had at least conferred 
one blessing on mankind, in doing away with the old 
padded ties that men used to bundle up their necks 
with. It seems rather strange that his name should have 
endured so long, since he was only an educated, polite, 
w^ell-dressed spendthrift. But for many years he was 
the intimate associate of the royalty and nobility of 
London. This made the young man vain, and he pre- 
sumed too much on his position, and on one occasion, 
when at dinner at the Carlton House, addressed the 

Prince of Wales in a very familiar manner : 

(190) 



BR UMMEVS RE VENGE. 191 

" Wales, ring the bell ! " 

The Prince obeyed, and when the footman appeared, 
said: 

" Call Mr. Brummel's carriage." 

Though Mr. Brummel denied this, it gained cre- 
dence, and has passed into history. But when he had 
fallen into disfavor with the Prince, he was able to 
gain an advantage through the Prince's rudeness. Mr. 
Brummel, with three of his friends, gave a great fete, 
to which the Prince was invited. He accepted the 
invitation, and when passing the hosts, bowed most 
graciously to three of them, and passed Brummel with- 
out the slightest recognition. Mr. Brummel felt the 
insult keenly, but happened to know that the Prince 
was very sensitive on account of his corpulency ; so he 
violated the rules of ordinary hospitality by asking, 
loud enough for the Prince to hear him : 

" Alvanley, who is your fat friend? " 

The Straits of Dover were on their good behavior, 
and the hour and a half on the water was very enjoy- 
able after so many daya of heat and dust. The chalk- 
white cliffs of England seemed to bid us welcome to a 
land which is nearer home than any other. Shakes- 
peare's Cliff is more interesting than Tower Hill, 
though the latter is crowned with an old castle. We 
have seen so many old castles that we have lost interest 
in them. 



192 WANDERINGS IN EUROPE. 

What idiots most tourists are ! They will spend time 
and money to get near or into some old castle, and after 
climbing up its narrow stone stairways, and rambling 
over its walls, will stop when they get ten miles 
away from it and obtain a field-glass to see what it 
looks like. They are excited about being able to see 
the ivy on the walls, and the very stones of the towers. 
It may be that some people are like old towers — they 
look better in the distance ; but if they do, it is silly 
to try to bring them nearer to us by telescopes. 

A young man said to me some years ago: " We have 
the queerest family you ever met; they are never 
happy when separated ; they are continually trying to 
get together again; and as soon as they meet, they 
begin to quarrel." Tourists who have seen nothing 
interesting in the castles when visiting them, strain 
their eyes to look back when ten or twenty miles 
away. But it is one of the happy provisions of nature 
that the highest joy is sometimes afforded by the 
memory, which, like an accommodating sieve, has 
allowed all that was to be rejected to pass through, and 
retains that which has the elements of true pleasing. 

We are in London— -the pride of England and the 
wonder of the world. It is possible only to give 
impressions of the city as it appeared to me. It 
might look different to other eyes. Paris is gay, Lon- 
don is grave ; Paris is smiling, London is thoughtful ; 



FROM THE TOP OF AN OMNIBUS. 193 

Paris is dressed in evening costume, London wears 
a business suit ; Paris is going to the opera, London 
is on her way to the market ; Paris is bent on pleasure, 
London thinks of business. 

The houses are nearly uniform in size, seldom being 
more than six stories in height. The architecture is 
simple and solid, almost severe. The houses where 
wealth abounds do not have an attractive external 
appearance. 

Some of the more prominent business streets are so 
crowded with omnibuses and wagons that it is slow 
traveling through them, and requires some skill to 
cross them. The drivers are experts, and carriages 
dash by each other so closely that the stranger holds 
his breath and braces up his nerves for collisions. 

The best way to see the city is from the top of an 
omnibus, which accommodates about twenty persons, 
and where lap-robes are in readiness in case of rain. 
It has not the hurry of Chicago, and can afford to 
stop while the passenger climbs down from the 
top. The streets are smooth and clean, being con- 
stantly swept by boys, who, with, pan and broom, 
dart in among the teams at the risk of their lives, 
depositing their collections in iron boxes by the curb. 
These boxes are emptied by night, the contents being 
valuable for the farm and garden. 

All teams keep to the left, in place of to the right, 

13 



194 WANDERINGS IN EUROPE. 

as with us. This seriously endangers the pedestrian 
who has been accustomed to look for danger in an 
opposite direction. But it is true of many tourists and 
others that they look the wrong way for trouble. 

The English people are very polite; not so demon- 
stratively so as the French, but substantially so. The 
Frenchman will ask you to accept some hospitality that 
he kjiows it is impossible for you to receive, and 
appear surprised and grieved that you decline it. When 
he knows that you may have another engagement at the 
same hour, he will express his deep regret, and urge 
you all the more to do him the exceeding honor that he 
solicits. If the Englishman knows that you can not 
comply with the request, he will keep his invitation 
in his pocket, and. tell you that he intended to invite 
you, but that he had heard with regret of your having 
a previous engagement. He is substantially polite. I 
have formed an exalted opinion of our English cousins, 
and am in a mood to honor the memory of my great 
grandfather, who kept hounds and horses in old Eng- 
land. The reader will excuse me for referring to 
him, inasmuch as he never killed anyone, or other- 
wise rose to prominence, but somehow it is irreverent 
to neglect the old 3 in the Old World. 

I have wondered how everybody knows that we are 
foreigners, and Americans. What is there peculiar 
about us, to enable the citizens of other countries to 



THE NATIONAL " SHIBBOLETH." 195 

say at once "Americans " ? A lady told us, it was by 
our noses. The doctor felt flattered, for his nasal 
member is well proportioned and shapely, but I imme- 
diately proceeded to humble him, by assuring him 
that they always took me for an American, and if it 
was by our noses, then my nose must be an exact 
counterpart of his own. The logic could not be 
improved. If things that are equal to the same thing 
are equal to each other, things that look like the same 
thing must resemble each other. 

There may be something about the dress, or manner, 
that enables the world to tell us where we belong. 
There is a "shibboleth" that betrays us. A young 
graduate of Oxford talked with me about it. He 
claimed that he could distinguish me by Western slang. 
I allowed my pride to resent this, and when he asked 
me how I knew where he belonged, I told him of 
the cockney speech. We then agreed to talk ration- 
ally, and whenever I would use a Western term he 
was to rap on the table ; and whenever he would use a 
peculiarly English word, or phrase, I would rap. In a 
little while I forgot all about the contract, as we had 
been earnestly discussing the problem of municipal 
government. He brought down his knuckles on the 
table with so much vigor that he startled me. I had 
used a word that is as familiar in Chicago as the name 
of the city. He had never heard it, and did not 



196 WANDERINGS IN EUROPE. 

know what it meant. I looked at him with a feeling 
of surprise. He must have lived on some " Island 
of the Blessed," never to have heard the word 
"boodle." Then I engaged him more closely, and 
introduced the McKinley bill. If you want to make 
an Englishman utterly oblivious to everything on 
earth, and in heaven, except the theme you introduce, 
just talk of the McKinley bill. He replied with an 
eagerness that was beyond control : 

" Don't you know, my dear fellow — " 

Down came my knuckles on the table, with more 
vigor than he had used ; but it took me some minutes 
to get him far enough from the McKinley bill to 
recall the fact that we had an arrangement to call 
time, when any anglicism was used. Then he said he 
was very much mortified that he had been so grossly 
familiar, but the American tariff always made him 
forget the proprieties of life. 

But while we discover each other's nationality, the 
people go wildly astray over our business, or profes- 
sions. I have more of a medical than ministerial look, 
and the doctor's gentleness and black clothes give 

him a sort of sanctimonious appearance. The reader 

* 

will kindly take another look at his portrait and 
verify my words. But if he were to go out with a 
manuscript sermon, and I with a case of surgical 
instruments, or with prescription blanks, the world 



WHERE TO BE BURIED. 197 

might be just as sinful, and somewhat more ailing than 
it was before. " It is better, therefore, for us to suffer 
the ills we have, than to flee to others that we know 
not of/' 

Saint Paul's is one of the central points of London. 
The building itself is an imposing one, and the services 
conducted within its walls are about as cold as the 
crypt beneath it. A few days after having attended 
religious worship there, I returned to visit the crypt, 
It is a cold, damp, dreary basement, more like a 
dungeon than a church, and is also extensively used 
as a burial place for the illustrious. I can not appreci- 
ate the good taste of anyone who would want to have his 
friends buried under the slab pavement of Saint Paul's. 
It is cold and chilly, and in every sense gloomy. I 
can go to the graves of the poor, out on the hiil-side, 
where the ivies creep above the remains, and the but- 
tercups come up in spring-time, and the robins swing 
their mates on the blackberry briars, and the red clover 
breathes its sweet perfume, and the sun bathes the 
little hillock, and the morning dews sparkle with the 
brightness of diamonds, and the gentle showers fall, 
and the white-sheeted snow piles up its castles, and the 
ice forms its crystals; but what possible pleasure a 
friend could have in going down into this sub-cellar, 
and stalking along by artificial light, and reading on 
the dull slab that covers the body, the name that 



108 WANDERINGS IN EUROPE. 

once was so dear to him, I can not possibly conjecture. 
I never saw the beauty of those words till now: 
" Blessed are the dead that the rain rains on." Visit 
the crypt at Saint Paul's, and you will be very dull 
indeed if you fail to see the blessedness of having a 
sepulcher out of doors. 

Christopher Wren, whose genius as an architect 
would have been even more apparent had he not been 
hindered in his plans by the stupid interference of 
James II., is buried here. It is said that he wept 
when he saw his fair plans so cruelly marred. After 
a blameless and honored life he died at an advanced 
age. A black marble slab marks his resting place, on 
which is an inscription in Latin : 

" If you seek his monument, look about you." 

But, as I have noted, that monument would have 
been more worthy, had it not been marred by one who 
had blind devotion, but no conception of true art. But 
it is not in Saint Paul's alone that the genius of Wren 
was displayed. In nearly every art of London his 
plans were copied, and many structures were reared 
under his direction. The great fire gave him an oppor- 
tunity for the fullest exhibition of his talents. 

In this same dull crypt are the sarcophagi of Nel- 
son and Wellington, whose names are interwoven with 
the history of England, and whose military genius 
changed the world's map. In a separate apartment is 



AMONG THE TOMBS. 199 

the car used at Wellington's funeral. It is made 
from cannon captured from the French. It weighs 
eighteen tons, and is without any particular attrac- 
tion, except its bigness and the use to which it was 
put. 

The efforts made to honor Nelson and Wellington 
have signally failed, because the memorials erected are 
not at all equal to the greatness of the patriots in whose 
honor they stand, and because the memorials themselves 
are not well chosen. The prosperity and liberty of a 
nation are better memorials than marble and bronze. 
The time has come when institutions of charity or 
education, founded in the name of patriots, will be 
considered more attractive than the lumbering funeral 
car, or tall shaft. The Wellington school or the Nel- 
son hospital would outlive the monument. 

I left the crypt of Saint Paul's, wondering why peo- 
ple will go down there to worship. I can see some 
fitness in a demoniac living among the tombs, but no 
fitness in making the church a sepulcher. 

As I was leaving the church I stopped for a few 
minutes to look at the Gordon memorial slab placed in 
one of the aisles. The inscription would appear bom- 
bastic were it not prompted by a brother's love. Its 
statements are exaggerated and ought to have been 
reviewed before allowing them to find a place in the 
temple of the True. The inscription is : 



200 WANDERINGS IN EUROPE. 

" Major-General Charles George Gordon, who at all 
times and everywhere gave his strength to the weak, 
his substance to the poor, his sympathy to the suffering, 
and his heart to God. He saved an empire by his 
warlike genius. He ruled vast provinces with justice, 
wisdom, and power; and lastly, obedient to his sov- 
ereign's command, he died in the heroic attempt to 
save men, women, and children from imminent and 
deadly peril." 

Part of this inscription appears like irony. There 
is a general conviction in the minds of all who revere 
the name of Gordon that his sovereign ought to have 
supported, as well as commanded, so worthy a subject, 
and that with proper support, he, and those for whom 
he died, might have been saved from peril. 

The criticism on the British government in this 
respect seems just, and yet no one believes that Gor- 
don was willfully abandoned. At most it was an error 
in judgment, to which his own injudicious confidence 
largely contributed. The Lord did not w T ork a mira- 
cle to deliver him, and he had no right to expect it. 
He should have first considered whether he were able 
to meet the enemy with the force at his command ; 
and if not, he should have refused to imperil his own 
life. His generous impulses and his wonderful cour- 
age and philanthropy did not save him from the natural 
consequences of the battle he fought. His death was 



GOING TO CHURCH. 201 

a loss to England, and being a loss to England is a loss 
to the world. 

Nearly all Americans go to church in London. 
The arguments are manifold: They have nothing else 
to do ; they want to hear the music ; they want to see 
the building. At Saint Paul's, we heard the music 
and nothing else; at Westminster Abbey, we listened 
to a sermon by Archdeacon Farrar, that was of special 
merit. He began by a reference to the elections that 
are always in order throughout Britain, gave a picture 
of the sorrows of earth, referred to the Homestead 
riots in America, and finally pointed his hearers to 
Jesus, the hope of the nations. I would have enjoyed 
the sermon, had it not been for a sort of creepy sensa- 
tion that comes over one when he is in a morgue ! 
The Abbey was so full of dead kings and queens, and 
poets, and actors ; it had in it so many effigies and wax 
figures, and marble statues, and monuments, that I 
could think of little else than " Meditations Among 
the Tombs." I had told the doctor that it would be 
wicked to look at the Abbey on the Sabbath; but when 
I saw it, and remembered how the good people used to 
go out during " intermission " and read the epitaphs 
on the tombstones in the church-yard, I was not sure 
but that I was getting too strict, or else the fathers 
and mothers ought not to have set us the example. 

There was very little in the Abbey worthy of note. 



202 WANDERINGS IN EUROPE. 

as we learned on a subsequent visit, but epitaphs, and 
all the people buried in it were good. The tombstones 
lie about the bodies that lie under the tombstones ! 
They would tell more lies about the dead if carving 
in stone were not so expensive. 

I once called to see a lady, and her servant said to 
me that her mistress was not in ; just then a member 
of the family appeared and informed me that mater 
familias was lying down up-stairs. " What an afflicted 
family!" I muttered; "the mistress is lying down 
up-stairs and the servant is lying down-stairs! There 
will certainly be a death here soon." 

But really there are many great people buried here. 
There are monuments to some who have found tombs 
elsewhere ; but if one sees the cenotaph, it matters 
little where the dust may be. There are kings, and 
queens, and lords, and earls, and dukes, and poets, and 
statesmen, and admirals, and generals, and painters, 
and discoverers, and scholars, and musicians, and 
actors, and singers, and princes, almost at will, buried 
in Westminster Abbey. It is a rich place to go if one 
cares to walk over royal dust, but really I prefer a 
house of worship that has more life in it. I suppose 
that it does not make much difference where we are 
buried, but I would prefer to be put away somewhere 
outside the church, where the little children may come 



THE AUTHOR'S HYMN. 203 

to play on the grass, and try to spell out my name, 
the only words graven on the plain stone. 

Doctor Parker preaches in the City Temple, a build- 
ing that will accommodate a large congregation. It 
was late when we arrived, but a gentleman provided 
us with sittings. The singing was loud and measured. 
Its welling chorus reminded me of billows dashing 
against the shore. The voice of praise completely 
drowned the great organ. Then, in the solemn still- 
ness, the minister began a sermon of telling power. 
It was one of those searching sort of discourses that 
makes a man look inside himself, to discover just how 
many mean things he has said, and done, and gives 
him a determination to be more charitable in judging 
his brother. But it must have been easy for Doctor 
Parker to preach, after such a song-service, and then I 
did not see any tombstones about. I think the appro- 
priate hymn for Westminster would be, " Hark ! from 
the Tombs ! " 

Though I have no appointment to make amend- 
ments in the hymnology of the Church of England, I 
think I could fix up a verse that would be appropriate 
when the Queen comes to service. It is not all origi- 
nal, and for that reason may not be adopted : 

Hark ! from the tombs the doleful sound ! 

Mine ears attend the cry, 
Lo ! England's Queen comes to the church 

Where she must shortly lie. 



204 WANDERINGS IN EUROPE. 

The church where Mr. Spurgeon preached will 
always be called Spurgeon's church, no matter who the 
pastor may be. Everything about this church is plain. 
The windows are of plain glass. The seats are the 
most uncomfortable that ever mortal occupied, built 
with special adaptation to backache, and other forms 
of penance. I obtained a sitting on the shelf end of 
a pew that was about as large as a pie-pan, and 
inclined from the pew end, to which it was attached in 
such a way that 1 felt all the time as though I were 
sliding off. It was a good place to be impressed with 
the insecurity of all earthly possessions, and of the 
little that there is in them to give rest. The floor 
had not a shred of carpet on it, and looked as though 
it was a stranger to brooms and dust-pans. Galleries 
extend about the entire building, giving a very large 
seating capacity. The pulpit platform is very high, 
and reaches out in an oval shape quite a distance. The 
building was filled with a plain-looking people, many 
of whom were Americans, clad in their traveling 
clothes. 

I was interested in the singing. So many people 
have praised the singing in Spurgeon's church that I 
anticipated something wonderful. The minister, in 
announcing the second hymn, told the congregation 
that it would not fit the tune to which it would be 
sung, and therefore he would adjust the last line of 



MUSICAL STRAGGLERS. 205 

each verse to it. There seemed to be no good way of 
stretching out the tune ; so he proceeded to amend the 
hymn by cutting off several syllables from the last 
line of each verse. Old Pocustes never haggled so 
wretchedly at the legs of his victims as did the 
preacher with the last lines. He read every verse, 
doctoring the elongated part of it as he went along. 
The people sang with a loud noise, but without any 
skill. They had no organ to regulate them, and hold 
back the too willing ones, and pull up the laggards. 
But they had also forgotten and differently interpreted 
the corrections made on the verses, and when they 
came to these places it was like a team of horses, 
attempting to pull a heavy load, by starting one at 
a time ; or, like a wagon going over the corduroy roads 
we made through Southern swamps in war times. 
They jerked, and jarred, and hesitated, and started up. 
One thought he knew it better than the others, and 
increased his vocal utterance to a shriek. The rest 
came in sure but slow. When all were done singing, 
near me, an echo came down from the upper galleries, 
or what seemed to be an echo. It was the lingering 
notes of musical stragglers, who were a few seconds 
too late getting into camp. 

I have always admired Mr. Spurgeon's sermons. 
His name towers aloft above the ministers of his age, 
like some tall oak above the trees of the forest ; but I 



206 WANDERINGS IN EUROPE. 

recognized his greatness more after attending a serv- 
ice in the church he left, than ever I did before. 
People who came to such a house, and engaged in such 
services, must have been attracted by the majestic 
power of the minister of the Gospel. Let not those 
who have not been endowed as he attempt to do what 
he did. Without a change in the house, and conduct 
of worship, the successor must fail, and his failure will 
be attributed to him, when he might have succeeded if 
rightly seconded by some regard to that which is 
comely and engaging, in the worship of Him whose 
glory filled the temple. 

The Parliament Houses were originally the royal 
palace. The buildings that formerly stood here were 
destroyed by fire, and the present immense structure, 
covering eight acres, has risen since 1840. It is situ- 
ated on the Thames, and parts of the building are 
below the river at high tide. Such stupidity in archi- 
tecture can not easily be forgiven. The buildings cost 
about fifteen million dollars. . Visitors are hurried 
through the palace, and but little opportunity afforded 
for seeing the different rooms. . The rooms that inter- 
est us most are those occupied by the two Houses of 
Parliament. The royal robing rooms are not worth 
seeing, unless one has enough weakness in his nature 
to regard with reverence the place where the waiting 



"big ben:' 207 

ladies unhook the royal robes and fasten up the royal 
bonnet-strings. 

But we do take a deep interest in the halls where 
England's wit and wisdom have for years been dis- 
played, and where English law has been framed, and 
where patriots have had the courage to plead for the 
rights of humanity. The windows in the Prince's 
chamber display the rose, and thistle, and shamrock. 
The throne, under a gilded canopy, is at one end of the 
room occupied by the Lords. In front of the throne, 
and elevated a little from the floor, is the famous wool- 
sack of the Lord Chancellor. It is simply a sack of wool 
about four feet square, and covered with red cloth. 
This he occupies when presiding over the Lords. It is 
emblematic of the fact that wool used to be considered 
the staple product of Great Britain. This great red 
ottoman has neither arms nor back to it ; and unless 
his lordship is supported by the dignity of his office, 
he must have rather an uncomfortable time of it. 

The clock-tower on the north of the palace is three 
hundred and eighteen feet high. The clock has four 
faces, and each dial is twenty-three feet in diameter. 
It takes just five hours to wind up the striking portion 
of the clock. The bell is a marvel in size, weighing 
thirteen tons, and can be heard over the city. It is 
familiarly called " Big Ben," after the commissioner 
of works at the time it was placed in the tower. To 



208 WANDERINGS IN EUROPE. 

the dismay of the architects, the bell was found to 
have a flaw in it, which soon developed into a crack. 
To take it down and recast it involved great labor and 
expense. A skillful man suggested that, possibly, if 
the crack were filed open, it might remove the jarring 
noise. The little crack was offensive ; but when the 
filers had made a wide opening, old Ben's voice was 
as distinct, and clear, and silvery, as ever it had been. 

The Parliament Houses are most carefully guarded. 
Ladies carrying satchels or little parcels are compelled 
to leave them in a waiting-room. Dynamite is the 
dread of royalty, and even a little hand-satchel might 
contain it. 

One day a proposal was made that we go to Green- 
wich observatory. I eagerly accepted the offer, and 
found several pleasant companions on the way. Just 
what we went for I could not tell. I knew, but rather 
disliked to admit, the truth. There is a ball on the 
observatory that slowly rises a few minutes before one 
o'clock each afternoon, and descends precisely at one, 
communicating with wires throughout the kingdom of 
Great Britain and giving the time. Cannon are fired 
by the current as far north as Edinburgh Castle. 

We wanted to see the ball go up and come down. 

As we waited at the boat landing, someone pro- 
posed to get weighed, and I, finding that a stranger 
was willing to drop the penny in the slot, mounted the 



FOUR TEEN AND THREE-FO UR THS STONE. 209 

scales. The hands turned to the proper place. I wiped 
my glasses, to get the exact weight, when, to my sur- 
prise, I discovered that I weighed fourteen and three- 
fourths stone. I squandered a penny of my own on a 
fellow who stood by, and asked him quietly how many 
pounds made a stone. He said, in a low tone of voice, 
" Fourteen pounds ! " None of the rest were willing 
to be weighed, until I, ashamed of their ignorance, 
told them I would calculate their weight for them if 
they would not permit these Englishmen to know how 
little they knew. 

We rode under the London Bridge and all the other 
bridges between London and Greenwich, climbed the 
high hill to the observatory, and sat down on some 
iron benches to see the ball go up. We waited until 
three minutes past one, and the ball did not rise. 
Then a man came out and said that the ball never rose 
when the wind was blowing, but that he would like to 
have pay for the seats we had occupied. It happened 
that the ladies of the party were all sitting at the time. 
One of the gentlemen protested against charging for 
seats in a public park, but they had to pay for them. 
I wanted him to prove that I had been seated. He 
could not get anyone to witness against me, and said 
he had not seen me on a chair and could not charge 
me. I told him I would not witness in the case, inas- 
much as if I did, the ladies would certainly have to 

14 



210 WANDERINGS IN EUROPE. 

pay for my chair too, and that would not be honorable 
in me ; besides we had come four thousand miles, 
and he did not have the show come off according to 
agreement. It might also be better for him to be on his 
guard, for when Americans paid for chairs in a public 
park they were liable to take them home with them. 

There was little else of interest at Greenwich, and 
we did not propose to spend another day waiting to 
see a little ball run up and down a ten-foot pole; 
so we returned to the city. On the way a boat took 
fire a short distance from us, and we watched the brave 
fellows steering it to the shore, at the risk of their 
lives. Two men on our boat lost their hats. The 
first man was too drunk to appreciate his loss, but the 
other one called lustily to some men in a skiff to save 
his beaver. It was finally restored to him for a six- 
pence. It was a genuine silk hat, and when he wiped 
it and put it on his head it looked as shiny and sleek 
as a seal that has just climbed out of the water. I 
never saw a hat come from the iron more glossy. If 
anyone wants to experiment with his own hat by dip- 
ping it in water, I shall not make any charge for the 
suggestion, but he will please not hold me responsible 
for the result. I saw but one experiment, and it 
might not always result as this one did. 

If you have any regard for your good name, never 
take a boat-ride on the Thames. Come to Chicago 



TRY OUR RIVER. 211 

and enjoy a pleasure trip on our river, but do not 
waste time and money seeking pleasure on the 
Thames! The excursionists are generally of the low- 
est class. One gentleman warned me of the danger of 
losing my watch. I thanked him, and was careful 
when he came near me. 




CHAPTER XIV. 

E went by the underground road to the 
Tower. The road is not entirely suc- 
cessful. The air is not pure, and the 
fumes emitted by the engine are both 
unpleasant and dangerous. No city ought to 
permit such a method of travel, unless some 
motive power is used that will leave the tunnel free 
from smoke and sulphur. The Tower is a fortress, 
and has been variously used as a palace, and prison, 
and museum. It was evidently intended at first to be 
a defense against a foreign foe, and then to be a terror 
to the foe at home. It was built so as to withstand an 
attack from without and within the city. The Tower 
stands near the Thames, and prisoners of state were 
usually brought inside the Tower through the Trait- 
ors' Gate by a sort of sluice communicating with the 
river. 

Many old pieces of artillery, which were captured 
by the British troops, or presented to the government 
by conquered or friendly powers, are parked inside 

the walls. If anyone has never seen the ancient 

(212) 



CROWN JEWELS. 213 

armor, he will be repaid for an investigation of the 
panoply of the olden time. But that which interests 
most visitors is the collection of crown jewels, 
securely guarded, but well displayed: The crowns worn 
by the sovereigns of England ; the diamonds on their 
armor; the precious jeweled garter, with the mem- 
orable words, " Iloni soit qui mal y'pense" embroid- 
ered in gold beneath it. If the story of the latter be 
true, that Edward III. courteously handed the garter 
of the Countess of Salisbury to her, and when several 
Lords smiled at him, replied, "Evil to him who evil 
thinks," his vow has been fulfilled, for it has become 
the most honored order in Europe, and the men think 
themselves happy who are privileged to wear it. 
Eoyal scepters, and rods of equity, and baptismal 
fonts, and bracelets, are shown, to the delight of the 
visitor. These, to me, seem but the playthings of 
royalty; yet in a room near by you may see the axe of 
the executioner, iron thumb-screws and collars, and pin- 
cers whose heated fangs were fastened in the quivering 
flesh of the unfortunate. In one of these towers 
the most illustrious prisoners were confined : Wallace, 
Anne Boleyn, Lady Jane Grey, Cranmer, and Wal- 
pole. To this tower the seven bishops were brought 
by guards, who earnestly asked a blessing from the 
prisoners. Along these waters, and into this tower, 
by this detested gateway, these illustrious prisoners 



214 WANDERINGS IN EUROPE. 

for principle were taken, while men saluted the barge 
and cried out, " God bless your lordships ! " On these 
waters the cannon thundered forth the delight of the 
people when the bishops were released. In an adjoin- 
ing tower the infamous Guy Fawkes, who, with others, 
conspired to destroy the King and the whole Parlia- 
ment, was examined by torture. The Tower incloses 
about twelve acres, but in history it is the richest 
mine that has ever been created. 

It is not my purpose to enter this department of 
investigation, but anyone who is at all familiar with 
prominent points in English history will recognize 
the Tower of London as the greatest historical center 
in all Europe. It combines all that is interesting in a 
palace with all that is gloomy in a prison ; all that is 
strong in a fortress with all that is educational in a 
museum. All that is terrible in tragedy, cruel in 
oppression, and noble in the courage of men and 
women, has been displayed within these narrow walls. 
Macaulay says that there is no sadder spot on earth 
than the little cemetery adjoining the Tower ; but 
certainly the spot where the dust lies is not so sad as 
the place where torture and cruelty reigned, and where 
the blade of a terrible justice was made bare. In the 
memory of this, I left the Tower, and the historic 
events were to my mind more vivid, and the sufferers 



ROBBED OF A DIAMOND. 215 

and sinners were more real, than the crowns and 
scepters and precious stones. 

Why England should display a model of the Kohi- 
noor, I can hardly guess. It was obtained by con- 
quest; secured because she was stronger than the 
Rajah Singh's province. It takes away much of the 
brightness of the original treasure, and obscures all 
the light that might otherwise be reflected from the 
model. Neither a nation nor an individual should 
display jewels that have not been secured in an honor- 
able way. A cannon whose use is destruction, or a 
flag that is carried as an incentive to battle, or a 
bugle that calls to arms, may be a rightful trophy ; 
but that can not be so regarded whose highest pur- 
pose is to please. The Kohinoor in the crown of an 
Indian prince would be admired, but the same stone 
in England's jewel-case loses its beauty. 

The National Gallery, in London, is made up of a 
very large collection of paintings, many of which are 
of merit. The names of two artists, however, were 
prominent in my desire to visit the gallery. Ruskin's 
wonderful word painting made me eager to see the 
works of his favorite, Turner. I confess to a feeling 
of bitter disappointment in seeing Turner's paintings. 
He fails in color, proportion, and perspective. There 
is, incomparably, more beauty in Ruskin's word paint- 
ing than can be found in Turner's brush work. The 



216 WANDERINGS IN EUROPE. 

author of " The Stones of Venice " pleads earnestly 
for truth in art. But dullness in art belies nature. 
The fading leaf may have in it the distinct light of a 
hundred flames and the blushing beauty of all the 
fruits of the orchard. 

But no one need be disappointed in Landseer. 
Expect something wonderful, and you will find that 
which exceeds your expectations. His dogs and lions, 
and other tame and wild animals, are wonderfully 
true. The eye has in it the sparkle of life, and this 
living eye follows you with distinct plays of passion 
and intelligence. One can not look at the dogs with- 
out feeling, instinctively, that the dogs are watching 
him. He has studied position so well, that the idea 
of constraint is lost. It is difficult to express the 
thought I have just now in mind ; but if the reader 
has ever had a photograph taken in the old way, 
where he had to sit bolt upright, with his head 
fastened in an iron clamp, and remain thus for three 
or four minutes, while the plate, falsely called " sensi- 
tive," was wrought on by the light, he will have the 
idea I have of constraint in position. 

In his " Dignity and Impudence" the great, good- 
natured dog remains serene and unruffled in the pres- 
ence of the little upstart cur. Who has not seen men 
posing before the world in the same relative attitude 
as Landseer's dogs ? One hardly knows which is the 



THE BRITISH MUSEUM. 217 

more striking — the self-possession of the mastifi or 
the self-importance of the cur that tries to stretch 
himself so far beyond himself. In the two dozen 
rooms are thirteen hundred pictures, some of which 
have been in the palaces of kings, and others that have 
been purchased at fabulous prices. 

If one were to visit London and see nothing but 
the British Museum, he would be amply repaid. This 
was begun as a library in 1753, valued then at two 
hundred and fifty thousand dollars. It has grown from 
that time in almost everything that will interest the 
student, no matter in what department of science he 
may desire to extend his investigations. The genius 
of Pericles and the skill of Phidias are to be seen in 
the marbles brought from Athens. The cradle of the 
race — Egypt — has been despoiled to contribute to this 
wonderful museum. Many students go to London and 
remain in the museum day after day for months, and 
even for years, and then come away unsatisfied w r ith 
the little they have learned of all that is to be dis- 
covered there. Thousands of articles have been col- 
lected in the different galleries that date back many 
centuries before the coming of Christ. The attempt, 
therefore, to give the names of objects of interest 
would be useless. 

The Rosetta stone is not of secondary importance to 
the student. This is a tablet of black rock that is the 



218 WANDERINGS IN EUROPE. 

key to the interpretation of the hieroglyphics of Egypt. 
This language was never translated until some time 
after the discovery of this stone. It was found by the 
French near the Rosetta mouth of the Nile, about the 
year 1799, but came into the possession of the English 
in 1802. There is an inscription on this stone in three 
languages : The first was the sacred hieroglyphics ; the 
second the common Egyptian; and the third the Greek. 
It was suggested that the inscription might be the same 
in each language, and by a comparison of the second 
and third they were found to be so. It was then 
believed that -the first, or hieroglyphic language, 
recorded the same thing contained in the second and 
third languages. If so, there was a key to the 
first, and by patient study an interpretation was 
given it which corresponded with that of the other 
two. Then the hieroglyphics on the Rosetta stone, 
as interpreted, were applied to other inscriptions 
on monuments and tombs and coflfins in which 
mummies were laid away. The Rosetta stone thus 
became a rude dictionary of the oldest language, hie- 
roglyphics, and by this means the most important dis- 
coveries have been made, and truths of history, 
especially of sacred history, have been verified. 

One can not but wonder at the singular providence 
by which such vast treasures have thus been opened 
up in the field of archaeological research. Copies of 



A BROKEN VASE. 219 

the inscription have been multiplied, and there is no 
danger of the knowledge being lost. 

The medal and ornament room is closed ; but by 
ringing a bell, and submitting to a little inspection, 
you may be admitted, after registering your name. 
The treasures of this room are rich and rare. They 
consist of ornaments, and coins of gold, and are of 
very ancient periods. 

In this room is the elegant and far-famed Portland 
vase, found in a tomb near Kome, in the early part of 
the seventeenth century. It is of blue glass, with dif- 
ferent designs in white. Although but small in com- 
parison with many richly-ornamented vases, it is very 
highly prized. In 1845 a man subject to temporary 
fits of insanity was looking at it. A loose brick was 
in the pavement, which the maniac picked up, and in 
an instant broke the vase into small fragments. 
A photograph of the little pieces hangs on the wall, 
and one hardly knows whether to admire more the 
vase itself, or the skill displayed in putting the pieces 
together again. It is only by close inspection that you 
can see the seams where it has been united. 

One day we turned away from city sight-seeing to 
visit the Queen's palace at Windsor, twenty-seven 
miles from London. The palace is delightfully 
situated near the Thames, and from the Tower an 
extended view is afforded. The rooms of the palace 



220 WANDERINGS IN EUROPE. 

were, however, so far inferior to those we had seen 
elsewhere, that we were willing to vary our experience 
by taking a look at the stables. One hundred horses 
are kept up in splendid style in these stables, for the 
use of the royal family. Costly harness and saddles 
for these are shown. Every riding horse has its own 
bridle and saddle, though some of the bits have not 
been in the horse's mouth for years, and the saddle 
may never have been on his back. It is doubtful 
whether Her Majesty has ever seen half the horses 
kept here for her use, and the one which she rode 
many years ago is pointed to with a sort of satisfac- 
tion by the attendant, as though it were worthy of a 
little veneration. The Lord of the Queen's stables is 
an important personage, and remembers well what 
horse has been most highly honored. 

Many of the Queen's subjects never sat in a carriage 
or rode an hour on horseback. Many of her subjects, 
shut in by wasting diseases, would have been greatly 
benefited by a little outing in one of the coaches that 
has not been used for several years. The use, too, 
would have been good for the horses, that would be all 
the better for a little exercise. The attendant showed 
us the carriage in which General Grant rode, when the 
Queen entertained him, on his visit to Windsor. It 
certainly is not necessary to keep up a coach just 
because the honored American used it. 



STOKE POGES. 221 

The more I see of castles and palaces, and now, 
stables, and the forced inequalities of life, the more 
heartily do I thank God that I am an American citizen 
and am not taxed to support royal pensioners. Ameri- 
can poverty is not forced to contribute to supply the 
table of a family that has no claim on it, and but 
little sympathy with it. 

On our way back we stopped at Slough, which was 
the home of Herschel, the great astronomer, and 
engaged a carriage for a drive to Stoke Poges and 
Burnham Beeches. The church-yard at Stoke Poges 
is the scene of Gray's Elegy, whose sad, sweet lines 
have gone through all the world. We took a branch 
of the old yew tree under which the poet penned these 
lines : 

The boast of heraldry, the pomp of power, 

And all that beauty, all that wealth e'er gave 

Await alike the inevitable hour — 

The path of glory leads but to the grave. 

Did he write the poem when seated beneath the 
tree ? Probably not ; the poem indicates that he did 
not, but you get all the benefits of association and give 
value to the twig cut off, by exercising a little credulity. 

The epitaph to his mother, by whose side he is 
buried, is very touching, because of what is delicately 
hinted at, rather than boldly expressed. It concludes : 



222 WANDERINGS IN EUROPE. 

" Here sleep the remains of Dorothy Gray, widow ; 
the careful, tender mother of many children, one of 
whom alone had the misfortune to survive her," 

Near by is the farm of William Penn, in one of the 
fields of which is a tall cenotaph to Gray, erected by 
the Penn heirs, with some verses of the elegy engraven 
on it. An old lady at the gate sells copies of the 
elegy at a penny each. The whole scene about Stoke 
Poges is one of peace and rest. There was nothing 
pretentious in the grave-yard ; nothing of the rivalry 
that cemeteries display in rearing taller shafts to the 
departed, thus keeping up class divisions, even among 
the tombs. 

In the fields adjoining, a herd of deer were quietly 
resting, without fear and undisturbed. A few miles 
further on we come to the Burnham Beeches, which are 
famed as the finest in England. The trees are very 
old, and show their age in their size and ruggedness. 
They have grown to measure many feet in circumfer- 
ence and have the usual gnarled and broken appear- 
ance of the same variety of trees in America. 

The next evening we went by train to the Crystal 
Palace. This immense structure is built after the 
manner of a conservatory of flowers. Allow your 
imagination to have a green-house several stories high. 
Inside, there are flowers in the different galleries, and 
as much cheap stuff offered for sale as you will find in 



THE SAME OLD SHOW. 223 

any shopping place, together with eating apartments, 
saloons, and theaters, cheap pictures and poor sculpt- 
ure. Fifty thousand people had come out to witness 
the display of fireworks. They saw the rockets go up 
and heard an occasional thud as the sticks came down. 

They clapped their hands when the set pieces were 
fired. Then it grew dark and I heard someone say : 

" The same old show ! Let us get to the train." A 
scramble and race to the various stations followed, 
and those who secured seats were considered very 
fortunate. 

The doctor drew the line at the Zoological Gardens. 
I could not persuade him to go with me. He evi- 
dently must have had a surfeit of circuses and animal 
shows when he was a boy. But I may as well con- 
fess, that I have a passion for animal shows, and can 
sit or stand for an hour watching the bears scramble 
for position in the park dens of our city. 

There is much to be learned from the habits of the 
black bear. He is so human in many of his ways. 
One day, when about to leave Lincoln Park, in Chi- 
cago, I heard a great commotion in the pit where a 
half dozen black bears are kept. There was evidently 
a bear fight. I have often gone to meetings to hear men 
disputing ; why not go and take a lesson from the bears 
about the proper method of conducting an argument. 
In the center of the pit a dead tree had been placed 



224 WANDERINGS IN EUROPE, 

for the use of the animals. It was strong enough to 
support all the bears in the pit, if each of them could 
agree as to the limb he would rest on. A black bear 
that would weigh three hundred pounds had gone up 
on the tree, and gracefully adjusting his head on one 
limb and his body on two, was soon fast asleep. The 
children had been looking on with wonder, and prob- 
ably some words of praise had been uttered by the fair 
sex. A king was once jealous of his future son-in-law 
for a somewhat similar reason, and why should not 
the bears be jealous because of ill-advised praise ? An 
envious brother bear that weighed a little more than 
the bear in the tree stood on the stones below and 
bore it as long as he could. Then his spirits rose to 
the occasion and he began to growl. 

Men sometimes growl, as well as bears ! 

Bruin below looked up enviously at bruin above. 

"What is that little upstart doing there? Come 
down." 

Bruin above seemed to real ize a principle of law, 
common among men, that possession is nine points in 
his favor. Bruin below intimated his rights by another 
growl, which I easily interpreted to mean : 

"Might gives right." 

Such things have been heard among men. The 
audience was divided in its sympathy, not an uncom- 
mon thing either, but was not sufficiently interested 



THE ARGUMENT AGAINST THE WEAK. 225 

to interfere. The big brother grew impatient and 
started up the tree. They growled, and snarled, and 
struck out with their paws. The argument was against 
the smaller bear. It is that way with men. The posi- 
tion was not good for a free fight, but the elevation 
made it all the more attractive. It is that way among 
human contestants. The little bear went down the 
tree with more of haste than gracefulness, and was 
snarled at by his brother. He slunk away to his den, 
and did not look out again, reminding me much of 
half of the politicians the morning after an election. 
" To the victors belong the spoils," and so this victor 
took the fat place vacated by the smaller bear. He 
had about him an air of self-possession, as he was in 
fact in the absolute enjoyment of tree possession. 

He licked his paws, looked out contentedly at the 
audience, and then, to show his indifference to the 
popular feeling, stretched himself out and closed his 
eyes, and slept like the historical babe in the nursery 
rhyme, on the tree top. I came home, and read in 
one of the evening papers about two French gentle- 
men who settled their quarrel, on the field of honor, 
with knives and pistols ! What a splendid thing it is 
to be a man ! How glad we ought to be that we are 
not black bears ! y 

I always learn something at the Zoo, and the visit 
to the London Garden, with its multitude of birds and 

15 



226 WANDERINGS IN EUROPE. 

beasts, was not an exception. A substantial structure 
contains dens of lions, leopards, and tigers. It was 
near the time for feeding the animals, and how impa- 
tient they became! They walked about as impatiently 
as some men do when dinner is but a few minutes 
late. The roaring of the lions was something terrible 
as they waited for their food. At last it was thrown 
to them in great pieces. I saw them eating, crushing 
bones, and tearing the flesh with their teeth. I 
watched them licking their greasy paws, and when 
they had used their tongues as napkins they stretched 
themselves out to sleep. 

" If thine enemy hunger, feed him." 

Among lions and men I discovered that a good 
meal is a great aid in peace-making. There are some 
creatures, called husbands, who are as impatient as 
tigers, until they are fed, and then they lie down and 
sleep without any expression of gratitude, either to 
God or their wives; but the old advice holds good: 
"It is better to feed the beast ! " 

Returning to the city, I found the hotel crowded 
with Germans, fleeing from the cholera. Everybody 
was talking of it. 

" It is in Paris ; " " in London ; " " in Liverpool ; " 
"in Glasgow." 

" It is on nearly every vessel ! " 



GREA T ANXIE TV. 227 

" My new dresses, that I bought in Paris, will be 
ruined ! " 

"Aw! I preesoom that we will be fumigated, and 
never get the perfoom of the sulphur from our gar- 
ments again. Aw ! " 

" Doctor, do you really think there is any danger of 
our being kept in quarantine ? " 

" The President of the United States will not allow 
any vessel to land unless kept in quarantine for 
twenty days ! " 

Many talk as though they had no friends in Amer- 
ica who might be exposed to the pestilence if strict 
laws were not made and enforced. The steamers are 
crowded, and large prices are offered for early ones, 
by people, who, a month ago, were clamoring for the 
privilege of staying abroad two weeks longer. It was 
refreshing to meet many, and among them delicate 
ladies, who had such sweet faith that they rested in 
perfect peace. 

The doctor had taken so much interest in hospital 
work that I agreed to go to Scotland alone, and join 
him in Ireland in two weeks. I therefore hastily 
packed my trunk, took the doctor's hand, gave him 
some fatherly advice, and was off for the land of the 
thistle. 




CHAPTER XV. 

N the way to Edinburgh we see the vast 
uncultivated estates that have been entailed 
and are kept up to gratify the tastes of 
some titled noblemen in hunting and 
grouse shooting. Telegraph wires were deco- 
rated with little pieces of white boards, to keep 
the birds from resting there. Their lives were to be 
saved from the dangers of electricity, to fall by the use 
of powder and lead. 

The difference between these estates and the wide 
farms of the western parts of our country is marked. 
All our lands are subject to equal taxation. The game 
wardens are employed in keeping people from killing 
any sort of game on these pauper lands. 

I suggested that the government could not hire men 
in America to attend to this sort of business. The 
fellow who would attempt it would discover that the 
lands were not well situated for health resorts. 

We soon entered on a discussion of the causes and 
cures of poverty. It was animated, to say the least. 

There were ten persons in the compartment, of whom 

(228) 



THE PRINCE'S BUSINESS IN LIFE. 229 

I counted but one, and all the others were against me. 
I modestly suggested that rum was a factor. The nine 
all had liquor of some sort with them, and frequently 
relieved their thirst by a glass of wine, beer, or whisky. 
An old lady was traveling with her son, and she was 
well provided with beer. 1 gave them a temperance 
lecture, and suggested something about the influence 
of a mother. She held the bottle in her hands a good 
while ; and then her appetite got the better of her and 
she took a drink, and threw the half-emptied bottle 
from the window of the compartment. 

Then I suggested that the keeping up of a non-pro- 
ducing aristocracy, whose luxuries were paid for by 
the people, was a cause of poverty. I found here a 
divided sentiment, when I modestly assured them that 
an ex-President of the United States raised poultry, 
and another practiced law, and inquired what profes- 
sion the Prince of Wales had, or how he earned the 
right to live ? That was next door to high treason. 
But I even suggested that the only things we knew of 
that he certainly did, were play baccarat, and attend 
horse races and prize fights. 

The parties agreed that all they expected to make 
was " a living." One of the ladies in the compart- 
ment vvas a farmer's wife, who had saved enough 
money to make a visit to her mother. She told us 
that she was prohibited from killing the hares that 



230 WANDERINGS III EUROPE. 

destroyed the young trees in her garden. She was an 
intelligent lady, and her conversation showed both 
modesty and refinement. When I told them of forests 
where wood was free, and of tenants who were allowed 
all the timber they chose to use, and all the coal they 
cared to burn, and of the broad acres where absolute 
possession might be obtained, and of property subject 
to taxation, and of government officers paid but modest 
salaries, and retiring to private life to earn their 
own bread by their toil, and of the poorest of the 
people having wheat bread and golden butter, and 
meat, every day, all of whose houses had wooden floors, 
and of the wages they received for their toil, they 
looked at me with wonder, and said that they had 
heard of these things, but never believed them. I did 
not agree with them in anything, and yet, when we 
left the car, they all bade me good-by most heartily, 
and more than one of them added, "God bless you," 
in such a manner as to convince me that I had not 
made them angry, and that a sense of justice appeals 
to every nature. 

At Edinburgh the hackman assured me that Dar- 
ling's Hotel was full ; every room was occupied. I had 
been warned by some of the strangers in the compart- 
ment not to believe what the hackmen said, and to 
avoid overcharges. I remembered the advice, and 
said, " I did not ask you whether there was room there. 



DON'T BELIEVE THEM. 231 

I simply directed you to drive me there." At this he 
became not in the least angry, but repeated his assur- 
ance that the hotel was full. I was about to order a 
porter to change my box to another cab, when he said, 
" It was full yesterday ; but if you insist on it, I would 
as soon take you there as any place else." I did not 
believe him, in accordance with my previous instruc- 
tions not to, and afterward learned that these fellows 
get a shilling from the proprietors of second-class 
houses for every guest they bring them. I paid the 
fellow the proper fee, which he took and then 
demanded more, saying that I had not given him 
enough. I did not believe him again, and was about 
to appeal the case to an officer, when he hastily drove 
away. 

Darling's Hotel had several vacant rooms, and, hav- 
ing been located, I started out alone to see the city. 
I climbed up Calton Hill, without being aware of 
where I was going, and, in fact, without caring. If I 
had been in the keeping of some guide I could not 
have gone more wisely. 

The reader who has stood on this eminence, an hour 
before sunset, of an autumn evening, need not be told 
that he has about him one of the most charming 
views afforded anywhere in Europe. Before you, and 
across the fairest portion of the city, is the castle, now 
occupied by Highland soldiers, who parade the streets 



232 WANDERINGS IN EUROPE. 

in their kilts, with bare knees and tall caps. The 
beautiful gardens, on the steep hillside nearer you, are 
crowded with people. Lovers sit on the grassy slopes, 
and well-dressed, rollicking children play about them. 
Still nearer you, on the left of Princess Street, is the 
Walter Scott monument. This monument is a Gothic 
structure that rises from the corners of a square base 
by four great arches directed toward a common center, 
where a tower, gradually diminishing in size, reaches 
a height of two hundred feet. Above these arches 
are many pinnacles, which relieve the space and give 
symmetry to the monument. Beneath the archways 
is a statue of Scott, by the artist of Edinburgh, Sir 
John Steell. Within the niches are many statuettes 
of the characters described in the works of the poet 
and novelist. This monument, which has many rivals, 
but no superiors, is the conception of a practical 
mechanic, Mr. G. W. Kemp, whose name ought to be 
held in high regard by the city, and by all who look 
on his work. He was a man who, before this, had not 
gained any distinction, and critics, who were unwilling 
to see one rise to prominence who had not been under 
their patronage, began at once to belittle him. His 
work spoke for itself, and nothing could be said 
against it, for the splendid monument stood there to 
proclaim his praise. Then they said that he was not an 
inspired architect ; that he was merely a copyist, and 



NATURE AND ART. 233 

had gained his conceptions from a study of Melrose 
Abbey ! But the claim is absurd, for there is nothing 
there from which such a copy could be made. It was 
not all original in the mind of the workman. He did 
not invent the Gothic style of architecture. But that 
was never invented by any man. All the great forms 
of architecture are copies from nature. God gave 
men models for everything in art, and he who takes 
from nature what is beautiful, and reproduces it in 
art, is not to be called a mere copyist. It is an inspira- 
tion ; and he who gave f ortb the form of the Scott 
monument had this gift. No person ever saw it and 
afterward doubted whether the mental picture was of 
this or some other monument. There is no possibility 
of forgetting it, and no danger of the recollection not 
standing forth distinct from all else. Who that has seen 
the cathedral at Milan will ever have a confused idea of 
its appearance ? In a cathedral there are many differ- 
ent parts to give it an individuality ; but the monument 
has not this advantage ; and yet this one erected to 
Walter Scott is unique in its every feature. It is 
absurd to claim that it is copied. As well might liter- 
ary critics charge Sir Walter with plagiarism because 
he used the English language in his poems, as call the 
Scott monument a copy because of its Gothic archi- 
tecture. 



234 WANDERINGS IN EUROPE. 

Near you on the hill are the ruins of an incomplete 
building. It was modeled after the Parthenon, and 
was intended to commemorate the bravery of the 
Scotch army; but as it is, it stands as a monument of 
Scotland's pride, and Scotland's poverty. 

Beyond the limits of the city, and a little to the 
southeast, King Arthur's seat stands out boldly against 
the sky. Every royalist sees on this mountain the 
plain form of a lion resting his head on his fore paws, 
but to my Republican eyes there was no such image 
there. 

In discovering mountain figures much depends on 
the vividness of the imagination and the lack of dis- 
crimination. The boy who said that, with certain 
things conceded, he could make a dog out of a stick of 
stovewood, was right. 

"Imagine a dog's neck and head on one end of the 
stick, and a dog's tail on the other end, and the whole 
to be covered with hair, and then imagine four legs, 
with regular dog's paws attached to them, fastened on 
the under side of the stick, and you will have the 
prettiest dog you ever saw! " 

If you will imagine enough of lacking details sup- 
plied, you can get a lion on the mountain. But it is 
this way the world over — we see what we want to see 
and are blind to beauties that we do not desire. 



A BEAUTIFUL PICTURE. 235 

Turning a little to the left you see the Frith of 
Forth, or the river's outlet to the sea. But the sun 
is getting low, and we look almost toward it, just a 
little to the north, and behold Ben Ledi and Ben 
Lomond. I could not have seen them had the sun 
been in his mid-day strength ; but as it was he seemed 
to be hovering above the mountain peaks, as though 
hesitating in his decision as to which mountain he 
would crown with gold. He smiled on both blush- 
ingly, refused to decide between the rivals, and sunk 
to rest a little south of them. Then you look back 
to man's work, down Princess Street with its palatial 
structures. 

" What do you think of it?" asked a citizen, com- 
ing near me. 

" Do you live here ? " I asked in return, without 
answering his question. 

"I do," he replied, "and I come up here every 
week to look again at this scene. But ye did na 
answer me." 

" I think, sir," said I, " that this is one of the finest 
pictures made by the Great Artist, and one which, 
happily, you have not spoiled." As 1 said, this I 
looked at the Parthenonic failure and at the light- 
house-like monument to Nelson, and added, "any 
place except on this hill." 



236 WANDERINGS IN EUROPE. 

I retraced my steps to the hotel and sat down, for 
the second time in my life, at a public table where the 
guests are pivileged to partake of food on which our 
Father's blessing has been publicly invoked. I formed 
the acquaintance of Mr. Yarley, a business man of 
genial nature, who took me with him to Carrubbers' 
Close Mission Hall, where a large audience had assem- 
bled in the interests of Gospel temperance. 

It is not always necessary to tell how little we 
know ; there is one chance in ten that others may not 
discover our ignorance, if we maintain a discreet 
silence. I had heard of close corporations, but never 
in my life heard of a " close mission. 5 ' We arrived at 
a narrow street ; and in place of the mission being a 
close one 3 it was wide open. Gradually the light 
dawned on me that a close is a narrow street, and 
that the name of this street gives the name to the mis- 
sion. How I missed the doctor now! He would 
have been so proud of me, that I had not displayed my 
ignorance but kept quiet, putting strangers to the 
trouble of discovering it for themselves ! Why should 
I be so forward in giving information to those who 
have not asked for it ? This mission is an eminently 
practical one, and is conducted by an eminently prac- 
tical man, Mr. G. A. Barclay. 

At ten o'clock the guests of the hotel, to the num- 
ber of fifty, assembled in the parlors, and when they 



A SOLID PREACHER. 237 

were seated the neatly-attired servants came in and 
took their seats. Miss Darling led in singing, a chap- 
ter of The Word was read, and on bended knee all 
united in a prayer to God, which seemed more earnest 
because it was offered up by those who had never met 
before, and they, guests in a hoteL 

On the Sabbath I went with the family to hear 
Reverend John Smith. The services were pleasing to 
me, and Mr. Smith preached a sermon that was very 
able. It was, however, a little too profound. He gave 
theology to us just like the hotels serve bread in Europe 
— not in slices, as in America, but in great loaves, allow- 
ing each one to cut it for himself. It means work to 
listen to sermons that are so profound. I am told 
that in his off-hand discourses he breaks up the loaves 
in such a way that all who hear him get more than 
crumbs of comfort. 

Men of great ability err in attempting to tell all 
that they have found out by a week of study, in a single 
discourse. It is possible to tell too much in too little 
time, and to tell it too profoundly. The sermon was 
one not to be forgotten, and its terse sentences rise 
in memory, like the thunderings of Elijah, or John the 
Baptist, many days after their utterance. 

Monday morning I found at my plate a letter from 
Mr. Barclay, informing me that he had seen a friend 
of his, Mr. George Hastie, the former Curator of the 



238 WANDERINGS IN EUROPE. 

Antiquarian Museum, who would call shortly, and 
devote the day to me. Mr. Hastie is one of the best 
informed men I ever met. He is an enthusiast in 
antiquarian research. He is thoroughly posted in the 
history of Edinburgh, and, to be that is to know the 
history of Scotland ; and to know the history of Scot- 
land is to be familiar with the history of Protestantism, 
for it is interwoven with that of Scotland. He took 
me in hand, and for nine hours led me through historic 
places, museums and galleries, churches and grave- 
yards. Many of the places visited were closed ; but 
when the guards saw my friend, they opened the doors 
to him. " Mr. Hastie, of the Antiquarian Museum ! " 
was my " open sesame." But how ignorant I was ! I 
had read Scott, and Burns, and Chalmers ; I knew of 
Knox, and Queen Mary, and Lord Darnley, and felt 
myself able to talk a little about every one from Queen 
Margaret to Victoria. But Mr. Hastie took me into 
old ways, that to me were new. I sat in the corner 
where Burns talked to the widow, whom he visited 
secretly, and imagined that I could get occasional 
whiffs of his pipe, and saw him drinking his pot of ale 
as he made verses and recited them to Clarinda. But 
Mr, Hastie was proving that Burns was a Christian. 
Some of his poems plainly indicate that he was a firm 
believer. There is, however, an unfortunate difference 
between the theory and practice of Christianity. 



TEACHING CHARITY. 239 

Burns never claimed to be up to the proper standard. 

But he did teach a charity that in a censorious world 

is very beautiful : 

Then gently scan your brother man, 

Still gentler sister, woman ; 
Though they may gang a kennin' wrang, 
To step aside is human. 

One point must still be greatly dark, 

The moving, why they do it ; 
And just as lamely can you mark, 

How far, perhaps, they rue it. 

Who made the heart ! 'tis He alone, 

Decidedly can try us ; 
He knows each chord — its various tone, 

Each spring — its various bias. 

Then at the balance let's be mute, 

We never can adjust it ; 
What's done we partly may compute, 

But know not what's resisted. 

No man ever took a firmer hold on the popular 
heart than Burns. He hated hypocrisy, and had a 
heart that was brimful of sympathy for the poor. 
We are unwilling to allow Scotland to claim him ; he 
belongs to us — to humanity. 

The Antiquarian Museum was closed for the day ; 
but this was a kind providence, for it enabled me to 
spend an hour and more with the former and present 
curators. Cases were unlocked at my request, that 



240 WANDERINGS IN EUROPE. 

I might actually touch the precious things. I asked 
questions by the hundred, and received satisfactory 
answers to the most of them, although my inquisitive- 
ness led me to ask some things that were unknowable. 
The curator read the hieroglyphics on monuments 
more easily than my friends read the hieroglyphics 
in my letters. 

We visited the Cow Gate and Grass Market, where 
so many thousands were slain in the struggles of the 
Reformation. We, like others, went to Saint Giles' 
Church, and sat where Jennie Geddes sat, and handled 
the " cutty stool " which she threw at the clergyman's 
head when he attempted to read the collect, saying, 
"Do ye say mass in my lug?" She missed the 
preacher, but she struck prelacy a death-blow, and that 
was better than wounding the dean. 

I climbed up into John Knox's pulpit, and thanked 
God for the Reformation ; then turned to the " Solemn 
League and Covenant." The original parchment is 
neatly framed and signed; in some instances with 
blood, in place of ink. The question is being agitated 
whether the battles of the Reformation will have to 
be fought over again. The highest class of ritualism 
is found in England, and Rome boasts that it is not 
necessary for her to missionate in the Protestant 
church. Meantime, however, there are notes of warn- 
ing sounded, and the church is casting about for a 



A CITY'S INGRATITUDE. 241 

reformer, who shall come in the spirit and power of a 
Knox, and deliver her from the thraldom that is 
destroying her spiritual life. 

Edinburgh is notably a city of monuments. Beform- 
ers, and statesmen, and poets, and writers, are remem- 
bered, and the young are taught to venerate the names 
of those who have made the land of Burns and Scott 
so favored. The beauty of the many statues is due to 
the genius of Sir John Steell. Everywhere you see 
his work. 

" Where is Steell buried % " I asked of Mr. Hastie. 

He said, "I will show you after a little." He 
pointed out in one of the old burying places a spot 
unmarked by any stone. I noticed it as strangely 
neglected. A thistle grows in the soft, rough ground, 
and weeds flourish beside the thistle. 

" That," said Mr. Hastie, " is the grave of Sir John 
Steell." 

It is a sad piece of neglect that no doubt will be, 
after a time, corrected. It is ungrateful to leave the 
grave of a man who did more than any other to beau- 
tify the city, without even a plain stone to mark the 
spot. 

There is no part of Edinburgh more universally vis- 
ited by strangers than the old Greyfriars, church-yard. 
To this yard three hundred cart-loads of human bones 
were conveved when Saint Giles was remodeled. 

16 



242 WANDERINGS IN EUROPE. 

They were deposited at the end of the church, and as 
no monument could be erected to the memory of the 
promiscuous and nameless dead, a bed of flowers was 
made over the spot. I walked about through the old 
grave-yard, looking at the monuments, and occasionally 
stopping to read the words on them, believing that the 
counsel in regard to the hackmen of Edinburgh might 
be applied to the epitaphs. The name and figures 
here were true, and, it may be, little else. But I came 
on one that struck me as original and I noted it down, 
only to discover next day that I could not find it again. 
But it was easy to remember. Some husband had 
prepared it for the tombstone of his wife : 

She was 



But words are wanting to tell what. 
Think what a wife should be, 
And she was that. 

" Grand fellow ! " I said ; " what a splendid husband 
she must have had, or was he one of those mean mor- 
tals who only speak well of their wives when they are 
dead?" 

I had read but a little while before, on the tomb of 
the historian, Hume, the words, " Behold I come 
quickly." How little we know of the real character, 
either from obituary notices or epitaphs ! 

It is not generally known that in the noted old 



"BOBBY." 243 

church-yard, where so many martyrs are buried, and 
which is held in such high regard, a tomb has been 
found for a dog. Still less is it known that " Bobby " 
is buried in the flower-bed over the martyr bones 
brought from St. Giles. The history of " Bobby " is 
full of interest. His master died and was buried in 
the church-yard. " Bobby " went to the funeral, and 
unlike other mourners, refused to leave the grave. 
He stayed by it, and when driven away returned again. 
JSear the entrance to the yard Mr. John Traill kept a 
coffee-house, and in him " Bobby " found a friend. 
Mr. Traill knew that the dog had refused to leave his 
master's grave, and made the acquaintance of the dog, 
seeking to win him away from his lonely watch by 
feeding him and taking him to his coffee-house. The 
dog appreciated his kindness and was a daily frequenter 
of Mr. Traill's place ; but as soon as he had been fed 
he returned and stayed by_the grave day and night. 
A stone had been placed above the grave, and under 
this " Bobby" found a resting place over his master's 
body. Mr. Traill made a bed for him there, but some 
people who regarded the dog's presence in the church- 
yard with disgust, lowered the stone to the ground 
and left "Bobby " without any protection.. Then Mr. 
Traill was prosecuted for harboring the dog. The 
suit called attention to " Bobby's" fidelity, and also to 
the kindness of Mr. Traill, and then everybody was 



244 WANDERINGS IN EUROPE. 

willing to shelter the dog. But " Bobby" was true 
to his friend, as he had been to his master, and daily 
went to the coffee-house for his food. It may be that 
the exposure to which he had been subjected told on his 
health, but after about six years of watching " Bobby" 
died, and was buried among the flowers. Lady Bur- 
dette Coutts visited Edinburgh, and having heard the 
story of " Bobby's " fidelity, erected a drinking ount- 
ain on a public square, and above it placed a beauti- 
ful bronze statue of Greyfriars' ' Bobby \ I was so 
much interested that I called to see Mr. Traill, whom 
I found busy, serving coffee at a penny a cup. I 
asked him about the dog, and he related his experi- 
ence to me, with wonderful simplicity. 

Then I said : " Mr. Traill, if you thought so much 
of the dog, you ought to have saved him from his 
persecutors. Why did you not own him, sir?" 

Mr. Traill looked me straight in the face, and 
said, with some little feeling : " I would gladly 
have owned ' Bobby '; but, sir, ' Bobby ' would not 
own me ! " 

I gave the honest fellow my hand, and said : "You 
have been kind to the dog. God bless the man who 
is kind to a dog ! But will you be kind to — " He 
seemed to think I wanted him to be kind to me, 
and was evidently about to offer me a cup of coffee ; 
but I added, " be kind to yourself ! " 



FAITH AND KINDNESS. 245 

For the first time I realized that in this humble 
person I was speaking to a man greater than his call- 
ing- 

His answer was : " I believe in Jesus and the 

resurrection ! " 

It may be that Mr. Traill's interest was due to a 
perusal of " Eob and His Friends," by one of Scot- 
land's most noted men. 

It is worthy of record, that savage tribes which 
kept dogs never became cannibals. 




CHAPTER XVI. 

OLYROOD PALACE is an unpretentious 
building, in a part of the city that is 
destitute of beauty. Occasionally Queen 
Victoria honors it with a visit, and finds 
that it is kept in good repair by servants, 
whose duty it is to see that all is ready, for 
the Queen may visit the palace once in five, or ten, or 
twenty years. 

But while the building itself is destitute of archi- 
tectural beauty, it has, to the tourist, a wealth of his- 
torical associations. The apartments of Queen Mary 
are very interesting. The bed that belonged to the 
unhappy Queen is as she left it, except the changes 
made on it by the lapse of years. The silk covering 
is decaying, and will, after awhile, fall to pieces. 
Her work-box is not now opened to the public, for 
many tourists have proven themselves rather skillful 
shop-lifters, and the precious things might be scat- 
tered abroad. But, through the special favor of Mr. 
Hastie, the box was opened, and I was permitted to 

rummage through it at will. There is an elegant 

(246) 



A TEAR-BOTTLE. 247 

specimen of embroidery on the inner lid, representing 
Jacob's vision at Bethel. If the foot of the ladder 
reached to the unfortunate Mary, it must have been 
down in some low valley, for her sorrows were great. 

The ordinary keeper, or guide, would have reso- 
lutely affirmed that the little tear-bottle belonged to 
Mary, and that the stains on the glass were the saline 
deposits from the eyes of the beautiful Queen. This 
is a tear-bottle, but Mary may never have seen it. I 
do not think it would have been large enough for her. 
She would have filled a half-dozen bottles of this size, 
any day, after having a little unpleasantness with 
Lord Darnley. 

I do not understand how the Queen of England can 
sleep well at Holy rood. She certainly does not 
believe in spooks, or she would hear cries and see all 
sorts of hobgoblins in her dreams. A creepy feeling 
comes over one of sensitive nature, when in rooms 
where crimes have been committed. 

I do not wonder that Mary did not love Darnley, 
though he had those qualities that make some men 
lovely in the eyes of a few women. But he was jeal- 
ous of the Queen's secretary — the Italian, Rizzio. In 
the room which we have entered, the Queen was sit- 
ting when Darnley came in, and, dropping down 
beside her, clasped her in his arms. He was not wont 
to exhibit such marks of affection in the presence of 



248 WANDERINGS IN EUROPE. 

her secretary. But the secret of the demonstration 
was soon disclosed by the band of hired murderers, 
who followed him and attacked the frightened Rizzio. 
The latter ran behind the Queen, grasped her dress, 
and piteously begged for his life. Reaching over the 
royal person of his Queen, the assassin struck the 
fatal blow, and the Queen's vestures were stained with 
the secretary's blood. Then he was dragged from the 
room, and brutally slain. How could she love this 
man after such an act ? These walls have shut in 
many a sad secret from the world, listening outside. 
She had contemplated a divorce, but Darnley took 
sick, no doubt caused by his tumultuous experiences, 
the raging passions and terrible remorse that must 
have preyed on his heart. Queen Mary seems to have 
been softened by his sickness, and the weak fellow 
received her assiduous attentions. Whether he im- 
proved much under her care, is not known ; but her 
love, if it were ever rekindled to him, did not burn 
very brightly. 

Darnley lived in a house by himself. This house 
was blown up and he was killed. . The Queen was sus- 
pected with having been privy to the plot. He was 
only in name her husband, and it is manifest that if 
she used a tear-bottle, the little one I handled would 
have been too large for the occasion. 

Both well was suspected of having something to do 



THREE MONTHS A WIDOW. 249 

with blowing up Darnley, but the suspicions were not 
generally entertained. It was hard to think that he 
would kill a husband in order to marry the widow, 
when by the laws of society he would be compelled to 
wait several years before forming the new tie. But 
the suspicion berime a conviction, when Mary's sor- 
rows were completely drowned, and she had her bark 
ready for another matrimonial sail three months after 
her husband's death. This marriage so outraged the 
public mind that she and Both well were believed to be 
murderers ; and the accusation was openly made. An 
insurrection followed. Bothwell fled, and Mary was 
imprisoned. With the rest of her sad history the reader 
is familiar. Fleeing to England, she was again made a 
prisoner, and after eighteen years was executed. Her 
body was buried in Westminster. 

But to return to the work-box. I was examining 
the tear-bottle, and trying on Mary's thimble and criti- 
cising her embroidery, and wondering where all the 
patches came from, and why she did not keep things 
in better order, when I ran off into this page of his- 
tory. 

The keeper seemed pleased to know me. I was an 
exceptionally fine visitor. I had not put the bottle in 
my pocket, nor stolen the thimble, nor cut a round or 
two out of the ladder, nor smuggled some of the 
patchwork. 



250 WANDERINGS IN EUROPE. 

Then I asked him if there was anything else about 
the room that was kept frofti the public gaze. There 
is generally some dark closet or stowaway place where 
old things are kept for the charity society or the rag- 
man. I was right. He had just such a nook for old 
boots and hats and things. 

" Yes, we used to show Lord Darnley's boot, but we 
have refused to let visitors see it at all now." 

"Why?" 

" If you saw the boot, you would know the reason." 

" Then, suppose you let me see it, that I may find 
out for myself." 

I was very anxious now to see the boot, since it was 
not exhibited. It is always that way with us. For- 
bidden fruit is sweet. The fish that got away from 
the hook just as you were about to land it was larger 
than any you had in your basket. The unattainable 
good is better than that which is freely offered us. 
The boot was produced. It did not look much like 
the patent-leather variety worn by the modern fas- 
tidious youth; and yet Darnley was a fop. It was 
square-toed, and had on the top of it an adjustable 
piece that must have been intended for kneeling on 
when Darnley was out grouse hunting. It was in a 
good state of preservation, except that the relic- 
gatherers had cut away a large piece near the top of 



A NAMESAKE. 251 

the instep. I might have tried it on, but I was not the 
least anxious to stand in his shoes. 

The house of John Knox remains, substantially, as 
it was when the great reformer lived in it. A stone 
in the street, with the letters " J. K." engraved on it, 
is the supposed spot where his body lies buried. But 
itf is intimated that there is no certainty about this, 
and that what was said about Moses may be said of 
Knox : " Of his sepulcher knoweth no man." But 
it is convenient to believe that the stone is directly 
over the body, and the old argument might be applied 
to this question : If he is not buried there, where is 
he buried ? 

The castle, to one who has not seen others somewhat 
like this one, will be an object of great interest. The 
regalia of Scotland's chiefs, with crowns, scepters, 
swords, and other curiosities of kingly and queenly 
attire, are securely guarded in the crown-room. 

Mons Meg, a great cannon four hundred years old, 
but now entirely harmless, lies in state in front of 
Saint Margaret's chapel. Where the cannon came 
from is a matter of dispute. Some assert that it was 
brought from Belgium ; but the more popular belief is 
that it was made by a certain blacksmith, of Castle 
Douglas, who named it Meg, in honor of his wife. If 
the gun suggested the wife, it would have been a wise 
precaution, even for a stout blacksmith, to have kept 



252 WANDERINGS IN EUROPE. 

the peace with her ; or else, before giving battle, to 
have sent an embassage and made the best possible 
terms. The cannon was kept for a hundred and fifty 
years in the Tower at London, but was at last restored, 
and dragged up the castle hill by horses and patriotic 
citizens. Mr. Hastie exercised himself, with others, 
in this enterprise. 

Guides have informed tourists that a cannon ball, 
partly buried in the Tower, was shot there by Crom- 
well, and it is looked at in wonder and credulity. It 
was placed there to mark the water level of the reser- 
voir on a hill near by. The regular guide tells so 
many lies that he believes them himself after awhile, 
and delights to excite the wonder of strangers. 

Edinburgh is not inappropriately called " Modern 
Athens " by her people. Her educational and charita- 
ble institutions are famed throughout the world, and 
the pleasing views afforded, either from Oalton Hill or 
the castle, are not excelled anywhere in Europe. But 
I can not forget the Cow Gate and Grass Market ; the 
miserable displays of rags and wretchedness ; the 
drunkenness and revelings in the low parts of the city. 
I have never seen so many drunken women in any 
other city. How many poor women reel along the 
low streets, or lie every night in the gutters ! If 
Jesus could have seen this city, that bears so many 
monuments of Scotland's glory, He would have wept 



BARLEY AND POPPY. 253 

over it. And yet so dominant is the temperance sen- 
timent in Scotland, that had she the right to make 
her own laws, she would banish the saloon forever ; 
but the English government will not permit this sort 
of home rule, and so the curse of the liquor traffic 
rests on a loyal people. Many are the sins that lie at 
the doors of the mighty, and the fields of yellow 
barley and bright poppy bear witness to a nation's 
greed. Is not England rich enough without traffick- 
ing in opium and rum ? But it becomes us, in regard 
to the latter, to think of America. 

It would have been a mark of disloyalty to Scotland 
not to visit Abbotsford, the home of Sir Walter Scott. 
The ride from Edinburgh is a short one, and the drive 
to the Scott mansion is pleasant. The house, how- 
ever, is much like the astronomer's garden : It fails to 
reveal the secret of lofty meditations. It gave me 
no inspiration whatever to sit in his chair or look at 
his books. I was as barren of verse when I did this 
as ever in my life. But when you are shown the 
relics that Sir Walter had collected about him — the 
sword of Roderick Dhu, and some of the trappings 
of Fitz James, and the knife of Eob Roy — there is 
some stirring of the spirit. The guardian of the 
treasures looked at me with amazement, or contempt, 
I do not know which, when I asked what great things 
Messrs. Dhu and Roy had done, that the old knives 



254 WANDERINGS IN EUROPE. 

they used should be regarded so highly ? He asked 
me if 1 had not read Sir Walter's poems, or knew 
nothing of the stories of the Highlands ? But yet he 
was not able to tell me just what they had done that 
was worthy writing and singing about, and why their 
old swords and hunting knives should be kept so 
sacredly. 

Melrose Abbey presents some of the finest work in 
architecture that you will find anywhere. The Abbey 
has been subjected to the despoiler, and but a small 
portion of it remains. It is said that the heart of 
Bruce is buried within its walls. The part of the 
structure that interested me was the outside of the 
walls, on which there remain traces of most beau- 
tiful sculpture. The chisel that executed this work 
was not held in any ordinary hand ; but, alas ! like 
much of man's work, its beauty has been marred by 
the very service to which it was put, and by the hands 
that were determined to destroy because of political 
or religious zeal. 

Once more I determined to get away from man's 
work to God's, and taking a last look at beautiful 
Edinburgh, started on the varied trip to Calendar, the 
Trossachs, and lakes ; varied, because it is in part by 
steam car, in part by omnibus, in part by boat, and you 
can walk to your heart's content. 

It is peculiar how careless some travelers become. 



CBAGIN-DORAN. 255 

A gentleman and his wife, whom we had frequently 
met on the continent, had bought tickets to Calendar ; 
but when they met agreeable companions, in the per- 
sons of Dr. and Mrs. J. L. Robinson, they determined 
to go with them as far as they could. When we came 
to Calendar, they said to the agent: "We do not 
wish to go to Glasgow, but want to go with our 
friends, through the Trossachs and by the lakes." 

" Then I will sell you a ticket to Cragin-Doran," 
said the agent. 

The ticket was purchased, but not one of us had the 
least idea where Cragin-Doran was, and the party 
who had purchased cared as little as he knew. He 
had time on his hands, and had a ticket in his pocket 
for Cragin-Doran, and he was happy. 

When the conversation would lag on other subjects 
we would always enliven it by asking : 

"Mr. Carpenter, pray tell us where is Cragin- 
Doran?" 

It became a little monotonous after awhile, but Mr. 
Carpenter was too much of a gentleman to show the 
least annoyance. 

The Trossachs is the " bristly country," and is so 
called because of the thick growth of wood, mostly 
birch and oak, that abounds there. Every part of the 
route is rendered immortal by the poems of Scott. The 
mountain side, w T here at last his "gallant gray lay 



256 WANDERINGS IN EUROPE. 

dying," would not be interesting at all were it not for 
the way he has brought it out in his inimitable " Lady 
of the Lake." 

Ooilantogle Ford is a canal of the Glasgow Water- 
Works. It is rather hard on the fancies of poetry, but 
does not interfere with its facts, to make historic places 
part of a useful system for supplying the needs of a 
great city. 

We had expected great things of Loch Katrine, and 
our anticipations were realized. Its entrance is by a 
very narrow way, described by the poet as affording 
scanty room for the brood of the wild duck to swim 
in to the broader waters. The mountains rise in 
rugged beauty above you, and in this narrow way you 
feel the power of nature to awaken feelings of delight. 

" Ellen's Isle " is but a little rocky spot that con- 
tains, possibly, three acres. It was a secure resting 
place, and Ellen's harp and song would have sounded 
very sweetly to the tired hunter. The place is sug- 
gestive of that solitude where the soldier or the hunts- 
man may rest without fear of being disturbed by the 
blast of bugle or beat of drum. - 



Huntsman rest ! thy chase is done, 

While our slumb'rous spells assail ye ; 

Dream not with the rising sun, 

Bugles here shall sound reveille\ 



11 ELLEN '# ISLE. " 257 

Sleep ! the deer is in his den ; 

Sleep ! thy hounds are by thee lying ; 
Sleep ! nor dream in yonder glen 

How thy gallant steed lay dying. 

Huntsman, rest ! thy chase is done ; 

Think not of the rising sun, 
For at dawning to assail ye, 

Here no bugles sound reveille*. 

A thousand beauties may be seen from Loch Lo- 
mond, including the islands of the lake itself ; the 
mountains that surround it ; the cascades that start out 
from among the ferns and heather, like frightened 
animals, only that they come toward you ; the pretty 
little villages that sit near the shore, like flocks of 
water-fowl resting their wings. 

We look on Ben Lomond and recall the song, heard 
so often in childhood : 

The sun has gane down o'er the lofty Ben Lomond, 
And left the red clouds to preside o'er the scene, 

While lanely I stray in the calm simmer gloamin' 

To muse on sweet Jessie, the flower o' Dumblane. 

Jessie did not put in her appearance when I was in 
Dumblane, and it is possible that her descendants 
have not inherited her beauty. 

But I shall always remember the lake and mount- 
ain, because of a picture painted there for us by the 

17 



258 WANDERINGS IN EUROPE, 

Great Artist. It was raining a little betimes during 
the entire day, and the showers were broken off by 
brilliant bursts of sunlight that gave false promise of 
constancy. It was a struggle between sun and shower. 
Looking out toward Ben Lomond, where the clouds 
were hanging, a beautiful bow appeared. It was 
formed at first against the cloud, and was not remark- 
able in appearance ; but as it extended down to the 
water's edge, the mountain, and not the cloud, became 
the background. I had never seen a rainbow any- 
where, except against the cloud ; but here the bow was 
against the green mountain, and this was continued 
even into the lake. Up to within a few yards of the 
boat, the bow was distinctly visible, with the waters of 
Loch Lomond for a background. " Behold, I set my 
bow in the clouds ! " was the language addressed to 
Noah, but here the bow was set on the mountain side, 
and on the lake, and both lake and mountain had new 
glories not painted by human hands. 

When we had entered the train for Glasgow the 
guard courteously informed Mr. Carpenter that he 
must change at some station, which he named, for 
Cragin-Doran ; but somehow he had concluded now to 
go on with us to Glasgow, and he never was permitted 
to see the town to which he had bought his ticket. 
This happy-go-easy way of traveling may seem strange 
to those who always have business taking them from 



" kyles of bute:' 259 

one place to another. But why might we not as well 
have gone to Cragin-Doran as any place else ? 

Rothesay, on the Isle of Bute, is one of the pretti- 
est places I have ever visited. The town lies in the 
center of a shore crescent, and every part of it can be 
seen as you enter. The first suggestion to my mind 
was that the shore was stretching forth its arms ready 
to clasp the inland sea to its bosom. I was com- 
mended to the hospitable home of Mr. Milloy, whose 
name is near enough my own to claim some kinship. 
I assured him that I could only remain a few hours, 
and then he said I must never leave without seeing 
the " Kyles of Bute." "We will take a look at the 
old castle, and then get the steamer and go out for a 
four hours' ride and come back to dinner, and you can 
still get the evening boat for Gurnock." 

Another old castle ! They are everywhere ! What 
business has an old castle in beautiful Eothesay ? 

But it is here, nevertheless. I walked through the 
castle and saw the great fire-place where an ox could 
be roasted at one time, and looked at the moat and 
the portcullis, and then to the boat landing. But 
I was lost, completely lost. I did not know what to 
make out of my friend ? s suggestion, that we visit the 
" Kyles of Bute." I was too impatient to wait for 
an explanation, and determined to be honest. I began 
mildly : 



260 WANDERING S IN E UEOPE. 

" Kindly tell me why they call this island Bute ? " 

" I suppose because it is somewhat the shape of a 
boot." 

" But what are the kyles ? " 

" You will soon see. The channels become so nar- 
row that you will hardly see how to get out of them." 

" O ! Mr. Milloy, I see it now! The island of Bute 
is the shape of a boot and the kyles are the narrows ! " 

"Why did I not keep quiet, and wait till I found 
out for myself ? I wondered if Mr. Milloy would not 
be ashamed of the stupidity of Mr. Meloy. But I was 
relieved when I discovered that in introducing me to 
a number of gentlemen, who were his friends, he did 
not tell them that my name had an " e " in it, in place 
of an "i," and that, therefore, we were not related. 
I breathed more freely now and began at once talking 
to the gentlemen about the beauty of the kyles, as 
though I had always known the meaning of the term. 
I saw that Mr. Milloy was proud of his relative, only 
when I made a dozen stupid blunders, which he cor- 
rected for me with so much skill that it was difficult 
to tell that I had made them. But as he did it I could 
see a merry twinkle in his eye. How jealous the doc- 
tor would have been of my knowledge, had he been 
along; but he was handling a scalpel in a London hos- 
pital. 

On a sloping hill-side, Colonel Campbell, after his 



A FOREST PICTURE. 261 

return from Waterloo, determined to make a living 
memorial of the battle. He had the position of the 
troops carefully laid out, and then planted trees, 
whose foliage was of different shades, to represent the 
various divisions of the armies engaged in the conflict. 
It was a splendid conception, and was carried out so 
fully that the forest planted by him, giving a picture 
of Waterloo, was famed far and near. But even art 
in living wood dies out, and the trees began to fade, 
and the ranks of living green, like the ranks of the 
old warriors, were soon broken, and to-day but a few 
hardy old trees stand here and there, on the hill-side, 
without any seeming arrangement. How like the 
veterans of our war ! The ranks are broken, and soon 
but a few old men will be left to tell of a great army, 
once so full of life, and hope, and courage. The for- 
est picture has nearly faded away. 

In a substantial-looking house, on the island, one of 
the family of inventors — the Stevensons — lives. He 
is now a very old man, and employs his time in 
carving ivory. His work is said to excel that of the 
orientals, and he employs the hours of life's evening 
in this simple way. 

After a sumptuous meal, at the elegant home of 
Mr. Milloy, I boarded a steamer that was crowded 
with excursionists, mostly from Glasgow. To my sur- 
prise and delight, I saw the friends who had been 



262 WANDERINGS IN EUROPE. 

with me on the lakes seated together, earnestly talk- 
ing. They had heard that I had taken sick in some 
hotel in Glasgow. The last person that had listened 
to my voice said I was sick ; but I was talking to her 
through a telephone. That always makes me feel ill, 
and sometimes talk the same way. It was cruel to 
bring it up again, but I said : " I am so glad to 
meet you! I thought Mr. Carpenter had gone to 
Cragin-Doran ! " We had a delightful evening 
together in Glasgow, and parted in the night, to meet, 
it may be, only on the other shore, in the brightness 
of the morning whose day shall know no clouds. 

Early next morning, I left the sleeping city of Glas- 
gow, and at ten o'clock, from Paddy's Mile-Stone, 
looked back to the land whose noble martyrs saved 
to England, and it may be to the world, the sublime 
tenets of the Christian faith. 




CHAPTER XVII. 

: T is not strange that Ireland is called the 
" Green Isle." It could not well be any- 
thing else, either in name or reality. It 
rains and drizzles day after day, sprinkling 
hills and valleys, and allowing the sun to take 
only an occasional look at one of the prettiest 
spots on earth. Little fields surrounded by hedges, 
and dividing the land into all sorts of odd-shaped 
patches, may not be convenient to the farmer, but 
they have a charm for the lovers of art. The land 
subdivisions do not indicate the use of the square and 
compass, and there is a seeming disorder about them 
that is refreshing. They remind one of a parlor after 
a lot of rollicking boys have beenin it for an hour. It 
may be very untidy, but it does not look stiff. There 
is nothing in these fields that suggests a checker- 
board. 

It is the middle of September, and the oats and 
grass are not yet harvested. It is cold and damp, and 
we draw up near the turf fire and rub our hands in 

joy because we have felt the heat. Women are in the 

(263) 



264 WANDERINGS IN EUROPE. 

fields between showers, turning over the little lap 
bunches with their hands. It is slow work, but it is 
the only way that hay can be cured in Ireland. I went 
out among them, and they seemed happy and con- 
tented. 

A number of women were making calls on their 
neighbors, and, in place of sitting with pearl or gold 
card-cases in their hands, they all went out to the 
fields to earn a few pennies by an afternoon's work. 
It takes more labor to harvest one acre of grass in 
Ireland, than it does to put up forty acres in America. 
Hay sells at about the same price in Belfast that it 
does in Chicago. It may therefore be seen that the 
wages paid must be exceedingly small. The land 
tenant or owner can not possibly pay the prices that 
we pay in this country for labor. A good man boards 
himself and receives from seven to ten shillings a 
week. I saw two honest-looking fellows at work, 
who had been in the same man's employ for fourteen 
years, and they received every Saturday seven shil- 
lings — one dollar and sixty-eight cents — for their 
week's work. These men pay a shilling or two a 
month for their little houses (about all they are worth), 
clothe themselves and their families, and have some- 
thing laid up in bank. Their wives occasionally turn 
in and earn a little money, which is so much gained. 
They live on oatmeal and milk, with an occasional 



THE JAUNTING CAR. 265 

piece of meat, which is esteemed a luxury not to be 
eaten too frequently. If the Irish people who have 
come to America practiced the same economy here 
that they did in Ireland, they would soon own the 
country. But we have demonstrated the fact that 
high wages do not make contented workmen. 

I admire the jaunting car, and disgust the more 
aristocratic cabmen by always calling for a car. It 
has often been described, but I had no idea what it 
was like until I climbed up on it, and thought I 
would fall down from it ! 

It is a cart, in the front of which the driver sits, 
and four passengers ride sideways, two on a side, with 
their feet extending out beyond and over the wheels, 
Choose your partners, for you must keep your backs 
to the backs of the other two ; and if the driver is 
swinging round a corner, which he is liable to do with- 
out provocation, it may be well that you have confined 
your conversation to your own partner. 

As we come near Belfast, Carrick Fergus is seen a 
little to the north. It has an old castle, once very 
strong, and still fortified, and a community of Scotch, 
the descendants of a colony driven from home by relig- 
ious persecution in the seventeenth century. But 
Carrick Fergus is best remembered as the place where 
William III. landed, and from which he pressed on 



266 WANDERINGS IN EUROPE. 

against the forces of James II., defeating his father-in- 
law, who had for years been plotting to make his 
daughter a widow ! William had married into a rather 
tough family ; but then we must always pay due 
veneration to royalty. Kinship counts for nothing 
among those who may wear crowns, if the countries to 
which it belongs are not on amicable terms. But 
England and the world owe a debt of gratitude to 
William ; for had the battle been decided against the 
descendant of the House of Orange, the inquisition 
would have been at work in England, and the world 
would have gone backward farther in years than the 
shadow of the sun did in degrees, by the dial of Ahaz. 
I was anxious to get away from Belfast, to see some- 
thing of the more rural life of the Irish people. 
Armagh is a country town, where the people come to 
do their marketing. The streets were filled with 
horses, and cars, and carts. Aside from the differ- 
ence in the appearance of the vehicles, one might have 
imagined that he was in a town in one of our 
older States on a Saturday afternoon, when every 
hitching-post is occupied and country produce is being 
exchanged for groceries and dry goods. Thomas Hall, 
Esquire, of Loch Gall, came to meet me and took me to 
his home, where I spent the Sabbath. Here I had the 
opportunity of testing the size of an Irish gentleman's 
heart, and I discovered that it was as large as I had 



"CLOVEN EDEN." 267 

always believed it to be. His liveried coachman knew 
the road to perfection, and the fine-stepping horse he 
drove, took the bit and made the six-mile drive seem 
very short. The homestead was once called "Eden; " 
but Mr. Hall divided it, and called the part he retained 
for himself "Cloven Eden." If beautiful trees of 
fruitage and shade, well-kept lawns, and bright flowers, 
yea, and a river flowing through it, were types of the 
old Eden, they certainly distinguish the new. We 
strolled over the farm and discussed agriculture and 
politics. It sounded strange to my Western ears to 
hear oats called " corn," and to be in a country where 
our Indian corn is not seen. 

On the Sabbath I tried to preach in the church of 
Kev, Mr. Smith, a man of great intellectual power and 
benevolent nature. He is an exception among clergy, 
men, having a little superabundance of this world's 
treasures, which he wisely distributes among the poor 
of his parish and neighborhood. Many a load of turf 
is laid down at the doors of the poor which should be 
credited to the pastor. 

The turf is found wherever there has been a decay of 
vegetable life. Under greater pressure it would have 
become coal. It is found principally in the low lands, 
but is also obtained in the mountains, where there are 
dishes in the rocks. After being cut out^ it is stacked 
up in such a way that the air passes freely between 



268 WANDERINGS IN EUROPE. 

the pieces, and is thus thoroughly dried, when it is 
ready to be burned. In a mild climate it makes suffi- 
cient heat, but in our rigid winters would hardly keep 
us from shivering. It may never be exhausted ; but if 
it should be, there will no doubt be something to take 
its place. 

It is comparatively but a short time since many 
looked with alarm on the destruction of the American 
forests, and complained when the solid oak or tall 
hickory, on whose topmost branches the squirrel chat- 
tered to his mate, fell by the blow of the woodman's 
axe. " What will the next generation do without 
wood?" Then the black diamonds were uncovered 
and the vast coal fields gave up their treasures. A 
younger man said: "At the present rate of consump- 
tion the coal will soon be burned, and the coming 
generations will suffer because of our prodigality!" 
But now, if we visit the old homestead, we will find 
neither wood-pile nor coal-bin, while age sits beside 
the glowing fires of natural gas. The same alarm 
holds good in regard to the stories of this being 
exhausted. It is well for - us to use the blessings 
that we have, and not worry too much about future 
generations that will not be grateful for our economy, 
I left the delightful family circle of Mr. Hall, not 
wondering that there was to him and his " no place 
like home." 



VILLAINS AND FOOLS. 269 

On the way to Dublin, the double compartment 
was filled with mill hands going to hear Mr. Moody. 
They sang as they journeyed, from the Moody and 
Sankey books, not very sweetly but with emphasis. 
At Dublin I found Doctor Davis waiting for me at 
the Shelbourne. We had mutual confessions to make 
of our doings while separated, and the two weeks 
seemed more than fourteen days to us. 

T took a drive through the city and then out through 
Phoenix Park, which contains nearly two thousand 
acres. In this park, in the year 1800, a duel was 
fought between Grattan and Oorry. It was during 
the last session of the Irish Parliament, and the day 
after Grattan had made a speech, that was for many 
years considered a model of parliamentary severity. 
He showed how much a man can say without violating 
the laws of debate. " I will not call him villain, because 
it would be unparliamentary, and he is a privy coun- 
cilor. I will not call him fool, because he happens to 
be chancellor of the exchequer." Corry challenged 
him, it may be because he did not call him a fool 
and a villain. Corry showed himself to be the former 
by making a challenge, and Grattan revealed himself 
to be a brother of the order by accepting it. The 
sheriff somehow had become aware of the time and 
place of meeting. He was there to interfere, but had 
no posse with him. General Craddock, Corry's second, 



270 WANDERINGS IN EUROPE. 

threw the officer of the law in a ditch, and held 
him there while the duel proceeded. At the first fire. 
Cony was wounded in the arm. The second shot 
Grattan fired in the air, and Corry was too much 
excited to take sure aim. The ridiculous occurrence was 
made much of at the time, but the real hero of the 
occasion was the brave Craddock, who held the 
sheriff down in the ditch. 

The spot where Burke and Cavendish were mur- 
dered a few years ago was pointed out. There is, how- 
ever, nothing new under the sun. The flowers, and 
greensward, and boulevards, have counterparts in 
parks, which you have seen in America. 

The only thing different to me was the deer that 
feed without fear, and remain in the park without 
being fenced in. They are as tame as sheep. If we 
were kind to wild beasts and birds, they would be 
gentle and tame. Years of human savagery have 
made them fearful of us. Man's sway over the lower 
orders of creation will be complete only when he has 
learned the law of kindness. The little child will lead, 
not drive the wolf, and lion, and bear. Society may 
be elevated without the thumb-screw, or iron collar, 
or gloomy dungeon. Gradually the world is coming 
forward to recognize a new king, who is omnipotent — 

I have again been disappointed in the south of Ire- 
land. The road from Dublin to Killarney does not 



IRELAND IS IN AMERICA. 271 

awaken painful reflections of the people's poverty. 
Green fields, where sheep and fatted cattle graze; 
houses with thatched roofs, but with whitewashed 
walls; flowers peeping through windows, tell us of sub- 
stantial comforts, if not of luxury. I know that there 
may be a great lack of tidiness, even where roses 
bloom ! In some places the " chickens come home to 
roost " behind the doors, and the calf is not put to bed 
with the children, but is tied to the bedpost ! If one 
is inclined to be aesthetic, he will discover many 
things, even in America, that will be in some degree 
offensive. 

But where are the people ? I had always supposed 
that Ireland was like a scattered village, and that farm- 
houses were to be seen close to each other, and that 
the lanes were filled with children. This is a great 
mistake, for you will go miles without seeing a man, 
wpman, or child, on the highways. Ireland is in 
America ! Chicago has two hundred and fifteen thou- 
sand of the children of the "Green Isle" in her popula- 
tion, while New York has a larger number. If the 
people will be patient, the landlord problem will solve 
itself. I talked with a linen manufacturer, who told 
me that some of his mills were closed because the 
American kitchen paid higher wages than the Belfast 
loom. 

It is not safe, when taking the tour of Europe, to 



272 WANDERINGS IN EUROPE. 

stop at Queenstown and visit Killarney, and it is not 
wise to go to Liverpool and leave off the visit to Kil- 
larney until you are coming home. In the first, the 
danger is that you will be so much delighted that you 
will say, " Killarney is good enough for me; I -do not 
care to see any other place ; " in the second way, you 
are liable to say, " I have seen so much, and there is 
nothing of interest in Ireland; I will go directly home." 
It was only because we had solemnly promised not to 
leave off the southern lakes of Ireland that we timed 
ourselves to be there. I shall never cease to be thankful 
that we took the Prince of Wales Road from Killarney 
to Bantry. It used to be said, " See Rome and die ; " 
but I would advise my friends, " See Killarney and 
live ! " for, ever in your after life, there will be in your 
mind a picture, whose richness and lovely tints, and 
bold perspective, will come before you, giving a charm 
to solitude, as you call it. We are so much afraid of 
long distance rides by diligence in this country that 
there is danger of our turning away from Killarney to 
reach Cork by rail. The route overland by carriage is 
forty-seven miles to Glengariff, and eight miles from 
there to Bantry, where you take the cars for Cork. 
But the regret will be that the ride to Glengariff is so 
short. The omnibus provides nothing but outside 
seats, so that the landscape can be enjoyed to the full. 
There is here a richer variety of scenery than can be 




- 



s 



FERNS ON THE OAKS. 273 

found in such combinations any place else in the 
world. The road is now up the mountain side and 
through tunnels in projecting rocks, and again on 
the heights, where you can look down on the valleys 
and lakes ; and anon by the sides of the lakes, under 
leafy boughs, where the mystic greenery of the fern 
blends with the leaves of oak and beech. We have 
frequent glimpses of mountain streamlets rising from 
the heath and bracken and leaping down the mount- 
ain sides, to mingle their waters with the Killarney 
lakes. There are lakes far above you, hedged in by 
rims of solid rock, whose waters drip over the brims 
like the waters from an overflowing cup. Here and 
there you pass old stone houses with thatched roofs 
and stables close by them. Barefooted children are 
about the low doors, and every feature of the face, and 
every flag on the hallways, indicates a scarcity of soap 
and water. But these are offset by vine-clad cottages 
surrounded by flowers. Ferns, with their delicate 
leaves, fringe the roadway and reach over the banks 
above you, as though to wave a welcome. The limbs 
of many of the oaks are covered several inches 
thick with moss, and in this moss the ferns have taken 
root and grown with their long, waving branches 
spreading down on both sides of the limbs. Look 
more carefully, and to the very uppermost branches 
of the trees the ferns are growing. The picture is 

18 



274 WANDERINGS IN EUROPE. 

fairer than could be painted ; the scene is more refresh- 
ing than could have been prepared by the skill of 
human hands. The oak tree alone would be pretty; but 
the oak tree covered with moss, and in the moss deli- 
cate leaved ferns, seems like fairy land. The branches 
that interlace over the roadway enable you to pass 
through verdant bowers. One might grow weary of 
verdure ; and, as if to relieve this, the delicate heather 
and its gayer sister, the heath, lend their aid. 

When, however, you have passed the summit, and 
entered the County of Cork, and the wide valleys 
above Bantry Bay appear, that which before was 
pleasing becomes enchanting. At each turn of the 
road a fresh surprise awaits you. The far-off mount- 
ain tops are hooded with storms ; the mountain sides 
are ribbed, and studded with rocks ; great slopes, 
reaching down toward the valley, are clad with heath 
and bracken. Irregular fields of grain are on the 
lower slopes, and now you see many a score of laugh- 
ing streams gleefully leaving the heights, like happy 
children off for a holiday. But this is only a little of 
it all. Light and shade play important parts in this 
picture. The sky is filled with clouds ; not one great 
dull coating for the whole, but a thousand small 
clouds, that float between different parts of the view 
and the sun. The patches of sunshine on mountain 



A POOR ARTIST. 27 



slope, or valley, or about your way, appear like winged 
birds eagerly pursuing each other in their flight. 

You have seen the photographer adjusting the cur- 
tains of his gallery so as to secure the right propor- 
tions of light and shade. The Great Artist, knowing 
that some of his children were looking on this for the 
last time, folded up and again spread out the curtains 
of the sky to glorify the landscape. He has been 
kind and considerate in other ways, and why not favor 
us now ? 

I wrote these words on the evening after the jour- 
ney, with the scenes still fresh in my mind, but with 
a feeling of regret that my pen was too feeble to 
express the emotions of my soul. The picture is on 
my heart; but I have looked on the poor art that 
seeks to portray it much as a parent might look on 
the picture of a departed child. Where are the 
smiles? Where the expression of the eye? Where 
is the soul that looked through the windows ? Where 
is the gloss of the hair, and the arched simplicity of 
the brow ? Where is the dew that was on the lips, 
and the rosy tints on cheeks and fingers ? Alas ! 
there is no art to reproduce these ; they belonged to 
the life within, and it is gone. So, as I read these 
words, I am pleased that there is a resemblance : they 
give a faint idea of the glory revealed ; but along with 
this I have pity for the weakness of the artist, and 



276 WANDERINGS IN EUROPE. 

profound regret that, no matter how skilled one may 
be, the picture can never be reproduced as I have 
seen it. Every sketch of the purple hills, whether 
by pen or brush, has disappointed. 

Not one tourist in a hundred ever takes this delight 
ful ride, because it has not been advertised as other 
parts of Europe have been. But there is another 
reason, even more potent than this. The pen of the 
novelist, or poet, has not given to lakes and mountain 
passes the charm of some fascinating romance. 
The southern part of Ireland has not produced those 
types of intellectual splendor that render the land 
of Scott and Burns so famous. It is not because 
the Irishman's intellect is deficient in natural vigor, or 
his powers of description are limited, for no people 
excel him in these respects. The reason must be looked 
for elsewhere, and may be found in an unfortunate and 
oppressive system of religious dogmatism, that has 
sought to take away the key of knowledge from the 
people, and in so doing has impoverished a once fertile 
land, leaving it in barrenness. Religious tyranny 
always reacts. A gifted writer, to have thrown the 
spell of a story about Killarney, or Glengariflf, or the 
Gap of Dunlow, would have brought tourists by the 
thousand, to look on the beauties that stupidity and 
bigotry have been unable to reveal. If the world is 
yet in its youth, the error may be corrected ; but it 



CORK. 277 

will take centuries to awaken an interest in a land 
that has been contented with the legends of Saint 
Patrick. 

Cork has so often been spoken of with ridicule that 
I was not prepared to see a city of so much importance 
and such business enterprise. It is the third city in 
Ireland, and has wide streets, elegant stores, and a 
general look of prosperity. If it were not for the 
depopulation of Ireland, Cork would be a very pro- 
gressive and prosperous city. A considerable garrison 
of soldiers is kept here, and I suppose that it may as 
well be kept in Cork as any place else. Two of these 
soldiers were in a compartment with us, two days 
before reaching Cork. One of them was a sergeant 
and seemed to feel the importance of his position. 
His companion was only a private soldier and kept the 
bottle of poteen ready at his call. A young Irish 
mother was also in the compartment, with a babe 
about one year old. The soldiers gave her the bottle, 
and she frequently put it to her lips, feeling great 
respect for the red coats of the British army. She 
even took the bottle and wet the lips of her child with 
its contents, and this so much delighted the idiotic 
sergeant that he asked her for the babe and amused it 
between drinks, to the great delight of the mother. 
It would have been a good place for a temperance 
lecture if the pearls would not have been trampled 



278 WANDERINGS IN EUROPE. 

under the soldier's feet. The sergeant became a little 
more hilarious and told the mother that he would toss 
her baby out of the car window. I was not sure but 
that it might be the best thing that could happen the 
child. Then he took it in his hands and laughingly 
held it out through the window, threatening to let it 
drop. At this she became somewhat alarmed, but 
really the babe was in more deadly peril when she was 
giving it whisky. 

Great preparations were made to hear Mr. Moody, 
and a building used for a circus was made ready for the 
congregation. I had a desire to hear him in Cork, 
and to know what sort of an audience he would attract. 
There was a crowd on the streets long before the hour 
for opening the house. Every part of the building 
was packed full and Mr. Moody preached the same 
simple Gospel that he does at home. There is a very 
large Protestant population in Cork, and this was fully 
represented ; but there were hundreds of Catholics 
eager to hear the Evangelist. It was the only time 
that I ever knew Mr. Moody to be confronted by an 
audience, many of whom were not in sympathy with 
him, and came there simply to jeer. He was equal to 
the occasion, however, and held them in control until 
his sermon was ended. Then he called for individual 
requests and confessions. Some of the audience began 
to laugh at each word spoken, if there was anything in 



A REBUKE. 279 

the voice or mariner that could possibly be ridiculed. 
Mr. Moody waxed bold, and talked like Paul did to 
Elymas. He did not call them "children of the 
devil," but he did talk so directly to them that they 
wilted under his rebuke, and then he requested them 
to leave the house, or else remain in it with a better 
spirit. The meeting was his, and he proposed to con- 
duct it, and he did. Many professed conversion, and 
among them several soldiers rose for prayers. I do 
not think that the men who tried to interrupt Mr. 
Moody's meeting would make another effort in that 
direction. 




V 



OHAPTEE XVIII. 

E had jested about buying the Blarney 
Stone and bringing it to Chicago. Some 
of the more ignorant people supposed 
that we were in earnest, and it was even 
hinted that the entire castle might be taken to 
the World's Fair. They have heard such exag- 
gerated stories about what Americans will do that 
nothing seems to stagger them. We engaged an enter- 
prising artist ( Mr. Guy ) to go out with us to the castle, 
and take a character picture of the scene that would, in 
all probability, occur if we made the attempt to carry 
out our plans. A delightful ride of five miles in 
a jaunting car brought us to the castle. The doctor 
had gone out by the train and I had ordered my 
favorite car. When in sight of the castle, I saw my 
friend on the highest wall, waving his hat. He was 
where in other times he could not have gone without 
an army and without serious fighting. But now there 
was nothing to oppose him. The gate to the castle is 
closed to all who have not paid a shilling to see it. 

The grounds are in the possession of Lord ( no matter 

(280) 



BUYING THE CASTLE. 281 

about his name ), who gathers in a considerable sum 
from visitors. One might have heard some excited 
people talking : 

" Och, sure, and you need not be fearin' that ; they 
niver could get it away." 

" Don't be too sartin of that. The Chicaggy people 
brought a whole prison to their wicked citty 'without 
ever disturbin' a brick, or sealin' off a bit of the plaster. 
They have the idintical hole through which their 
soldiers got out, and are gathering in shillings for 
allowing people to look into it." 

We obtained a fine picture of the castle for the 
Illustrated World's Fair, with Doctor Davis in the act 
of negotiating for the stone. Mr. Rose-Cleland, a 
manufacturer of Armagh, is posing as salesman, while 
his sister represents Ireland and begs her brother not 
to barter away the stone. An earnest advocate is 
about to strike the doctor a blow, which does not fall 
because of timely assistance. 

I thought of getting a more savage Irishman to 
handle the stick; but, on reflection, concluded it might 
be better to get a mild specimen, for fear that Pat 
might think it would make it more realistic to deal the 
blow, or try his valor on the slender youth who dared 
to interfere. The picture is not so striking as it would 
have been in that case , but it was the striking part 
that I wanted to avoid. As it is, the picture will be 



282 WANDERINGS IN EUROPE. 

looked at in sober earnest by some of the lower classes, 
and they will say that they would have done without 
any poteen for half a day to have had the chance the 
fellow had in the picture. An Irishman would rather 
fight than eat when he has little hunger and a good 
chance to try his muscular power. He will knock 
his friend down, and wonder, when he becomes irri- 
tated about it, that he does not know how to take a 
joke. 

The picture is an excellent one of the castle, and I 
am sure that the reader will forgive me for not taking 
a larger man to restrain from an act of violence. 

The stone is the lowest one in a projection of the 
wall, near the top. This projection extends about the 
tower, and is supported by stone brackets, as distinctly 
seen in the engraving. This outer wall is about six 
feet in height, and was used for a double defense 
when the enemy sought to attack the castle. Between 
the top of the main wall and this projected wall there 
is an opening the width of the brackets, which is 
about three feet. The defenders of the castle could 
stand safe from attack, and drop stones on the 
heads of the assailants who came near the walls. The 
stone may be seen near the center of this outer pro- 
jected wall, and is the lowest stone of it, directly 
above the windows. To kiss it, one had to be held 
by the feet, and even then reach out the full length 






■"' - --- 







BUYING BLARNEY CASTLE. 



DANGEROUS KISSING. 283 

of the bracket. A few years ago a man lost his life 
in attempting to kiss the stone. Another foolish 
fellow made a similar effort, and fell on the bushes 
below, and escaped with a broken ankle. Kissing may 
be very pleasant, but it has not always been safe. 
But now a few iron bars have been put across the 
opening, and anyone who has sufficient faith may 
sink on bended knee, and lowering his head in a very 
humble way, kiss at pleasure, for the stone is too 
unsophistical to protest. But it is a favor that 
requires you to get on your knees before it will be 
granted. Sir Walter Scott visited the castle and 
kissed the stone when it meant some risk to accomplish 
the task. 

I suppose that in this, as in the social kiss, there 
may be various reasons assigned for the indulgence. 
Some kiss for fun, and others in deep earnest, but it 
is not probable that anyone kisses the stone out of 
sheer hypocrisy. Different accounts are given of the 
origin of the custom, and of the power of the stone 
to give eloquence and grace to the lips. A name 
would not have been attached to the castle without 
some reason, and that which is most probable is, that 
the old lord who owned the castle was away from 
home when his enemy came and demanded its sur- 
render. There were not enough retainers left to hold 
out against the foe. The wife of the lord therefore 



284 WANDERINGS IN EUROPE. 

tried her skill in flattering the enemy. She made 
them fair promises, and secured a delay of the hostil- 
ities. Day after day she renewed her pleas to the 
demand for surrender, always praising the gallantry 
and good looks of the enemy. She carried her point, 
and kept off the day of battle until her lord returned 
and defeated the enemy, whom she had deceived. 
Thus the castle was called Blarney, and the word has 
passed into common use. It is true that some try to 
attribute it to a form of a French word, signifying 
falsehood, but its real significance and use come from 
the castle. How the notion of becoming gifted by 
kissing the stone arose no one knows, and while few 
have any faith in the process, many tourists use the 
means and then go home to talk as bitterly as before. 

But, after all, there is a lesson here that it might be 
well for us to learn. Men and women are seldom 
driven, but may be persuaded. The one of harsh and 
sarcastic speech will be avoided by those who care for 
their own comfort. "A soft answer turneth away 
wrath." A harsh answer may provoke a blow. Others 
may learn not to be deceived by fair speeches and 
promises. Many a modern Delilah has won the heart 
of a great Samson, and then shaved off his locks and 
turned the Philistines loose on him. 

I was seriously rebuked by a lady ? for kissing the 
Blarney stone. " It was vulgar and dangerous. Think 



SACEEDNESS OF HER LIPS, 285 

how many people have kissed the stone just where you 
did! Ugh ! It makes the cold chills run over me to 
think of it. Disease is communicated in that way, 
and I fear that evil results may follow." Then she 
thought to soften her rebukes, and tone her indignation 
down a little, and added : " In your case, too, it was 
so absurd. You know, or ought to know that, for all 
your friends know that you have not the least occasion 
to resort to any extraordinary means to secure sweet- 
ness of speech !" I sat and listened, while she made 
change with the conductor. Without ever regarding 
the sacredness of her own lips, and considering the 
danger of bacteria, she whipped out a dime, in place 
of a nickel, and putting the coin in her mouth, held it 
between her teeth ! How the chills ran oxer me ! A 
microscope might have revealed ten thousand bacterid, 
or animalcule, or bacilli, or some other " a " or " i," 
skipping off the dime, and exploring the hidden 
sweetness of her dainty little mouth. The conductor 
took the dime in his rough hand, and put it into his 
old pocket, among a pile of similar pieces, ready to be 
taken between the lips of some fastidious party who 
would not endanger her life by kissing a stone that is 
washed by the perpetual showers of Ireland. I advise 
all young men, before sealing the engagement, to make 
sure that their chosen partners have not carried filthy 
lucre between their teeth, however much they may 



286 WANDERINGS IN EUROPE. 

be pleased to know that they have it deposited in 
bank. 

We were anxious to have our pictures finished, to 
bring with us, and I consented to remain, and let the 
artist and our friends go in the jaunting car. I found 
a little hotel, where a number of strangers were 
taking lunch, and, after listening to their conversation, 
went out to find that our joke was liable to become 
more serious than we had intended. I was asked to 
reveal the object of our visit, and what was the 
meaning of the talk of taking away the stone. I 
remembered the story of Mrs. McCarthy keeping the 
enemy out of the castle until her lord came home, 
and began telling them about America, and their 
friends there, until the train came up, and thus 
escaped from danger, real or imagined. 

The next morning the doctor remembered that he 
had considerable shopping to do. He was to bring 
souvenir spoons from Paris, and London, and Venice, 
and a half-dozen other cities. He had to bring home 
treasures from Switzerland, and Italy, and Germany. 
We tried to shop. But everything was Irish. Every 
piece of jewelry had shamrocks on it; every souvenir 
spoon had shamrocks on it. There was nothing Italian 
or French to be had. We were at our wits' end. I 
suggested that we buy all our friends shillelahs, but 
he thought it might be better not to tempt them. 



SHOPPING. 287 

We went from one shop to another, seeking something 
to suit the individual necessities with more eagerness 
than ever Saul sought for his father's asses. 

We found it difficult to remember what stores we 
had been in. We asked for breastpins, and rings, 
and spoons, and knives and forks, and lace handker- 
chiefs, and gloves. We exhausted our shopping 
vocabulary. I told the doctor he ought to have 
taken my advice, and filled up his trunk with wooden 
shoes. Then we made the rounds again, but every- 
thing was Irish. In despair, we bought several pack- 
ages of cholera mixture, for which the doctor had 
given a prescription. But these were not suitable 
for presents. We relieved the tedium of looking, by 
occasionally buying a half-dozen handkerchiefs, or a 
few pairs of socks. Then we would go back to the 
jewelry stores, and buy another spoon with shamrocks 
on it. The only things we had that were certainly 
proper for presents we collected during the last 
hour. They were two Irish blackthorns, a little pot 
of shamrock, and a crock of ivy. 

I will never be a successful shopper. It takes more 
tact than I can command. When in London, the 
doctor told me that he wished I would buy some- 
thing for one of his friends. I thought, now I will 
astonish him. I asked a couple of American ladies of 
excellent taste, if they would go shopping with me. 



288 WANDERINGS IN EUROPE. 

They consented. The mother and daughter both said 
they would go. Now, I will succeed. I have the 
taste of the middle-aged and the young. We went to 
a great store on Regent Street. 

" Did you ever go shopping ? " 

" No, I never did. Is it pleasant ? Are the shop- 
keepers glad to see you ? " 

" O, certainly they will be glad; but it is not necessary 
to take things because they have shown them to you." 

" But suppose that they tell me this is what I want, 
will I not take it ? » 

" Not at all. You are supposed to know what suits 
you, better than any stranger." 

" But, forgive me for suggesting that they have 
more experience." I promised that I would not buy 
an j thing simply because the shop-keeper said it was 
the proper thing for me. How polite the gentleman 
was who met us at the door ! He bowed, and asked 
what he could show us. I supposed he wanted to sell, 
but he said he wanted to show anything. He took 
us to a counter, and a lady about forty-five, who was 
dressed as though she were twenty, smiled on us and 
began to exhibit things. 

" This, I know, will suit you." 

I was going to take it on her recommendation, 
when I saw the ladies smiling to each other. I wanted 
to be suited. I consulted the ladies, and they said we 



TOO CONFIDENTIAL. 289 

had better look some place else. The lady returned 
with something that was "the prettiest thing in 
London." I knew that was what we wanted, but told 
her that we need not take things simply because she 
had shown them to us 9 and that shop-keepers were 
pleased to exhibit their goods whether customers 
bought or not. She wanted to know how I knew 
this, and I looked at the ladies, who were smiling, as 
much as to say, " It will be all right to tell her," and 
sol told her that I had never been shopping before in 
my life, but that the ladies had told me this, and I knew 
it must be so. 

They all laughed. I told her then that her goods 
were very pretty, but we would look around a little, 
and if we did not find anything that pleased us as well 
as her goods did, we would return. Would she lay 
aside the goods for us ? It was hardly worth while 
to do this, for it was as easy for her to get them 
out of the case, as it would be to look them up if she 
put them away. . She did not smile at this, but said 
she hoped to see us again. 

The ladies told me that I would be a splendid 
shopper, but that it might be well for me not to be 
so confidential on short acquaintance. 

We visited several other stores and then held a 
council, at which it was unanimously agreed that we 
could do better at the first place than anywhere we 

19 



290 WANDERINGS IN EUROPE. 

had been. As we returned, the ladies said that the 
shop-lady would be glad to see me. She did not say 
this when we came to her counter again ; and so I 
asked her if she was, and she replied, "I am de- 
lighted." I now knew that the ladies who were with 
me were wiser than I was. I went on and told the 
saleslady that we had been ever so many places, 
and had returned to take her goods, and that it was a 
far higher compliment to her to come back and buy 
the things we had looked at before, than it would have 
been for us to have taken them at first sight ! At 
this all the ladies laughed, and the seller of the goods 
said we certainly had shown good taste ! How easy 
it is for people to give compliments when they are 
merited. My friends complimented me on the attain- 
ments I had made and said I should not go by myself to 
buy anything ; that they could get a whole party to go 
with me. But I did not see the need of having so 
many to counsel when the shop-keepers were willing 
to advise you what to buy. 

But this is a digression. The doctor thought we 
could get all the other foreign goods in New York, 
and save duties. I was so sorry that we did not begin 
extensive shopping sooner. It is educational, and 
tests our merits and graces to the utmost. At this 
writing, one month after our return, the ivy has gone 
with the twining woodbine. One sprig of shamrock is 



THE DELICATE SHAMROCK. 291 

struggling for life, but its breathing is not satisfactory. 
The black-thorn canes are still in our possession, and 
will likely remain with us, as nobody was willing to 
accept them. We can replace the ivy somewhere in 
Chicago, and no one can prove that it did not come 
from Ireland. I do not wonder that ladies do so 
much shopping. It is a delight ; a joy ; a refreshing ! 
We heard the far-famed bells of Shandon and 
recalled the words of Francis Mahoney : 

With deep affection 

And recollection, 

I often think of those Shandon bells ; 

Whose sounds so wild, would, 

In the days of my childhood, 

Fling around my cradle their magic spells. 

But we failed to recognize any particular charm in 
their tolling, even when " on the waters of the Eiver 
Lee." But I have believed for a long time that our 
appreciation depends very much on the relation we sus- 
tain to the one who speaks or sings, or to the bell that 
rings. There is also a good degree of poetic license 
taken with the truth in the lines quoted. Mahoney 
must have been a remarkable baby, if, when writhing 
with colic, or cutting teeth in his cradle, there were 
any magic spells thrown about him by the church bells. 



292 WANDERINGS IN EUROPE. 

We went to Queenstown by boat, thus obtaining a 
sight of the River Lee, with its green, sloping banks. 
It was a fitting close to a journey through Ireland. 

Queenstown has a magnificent harbor ; large enough, 
it is claimed, to hold the combined navies of the world. 
It is fortified, and, to some extent, undermined in such 
a way as to render a near approach by hostile vessels 
very dangerous. But, with present armaments, a ves- 
sel could besiege the city successfully, at a distance too 
great to be hindered by guns on land. 

We saw some peculiar developments of the Irish 
life — the abject poverty of the poor and the shrewd- 
ness of the well-to-do. Miserable-looking women, 
half clad, and in their bare feet, begging with 
the utmost persistency that you buy a little shamrock, 
or some pipes or canes from them. They follow you 
persistently for blocks, and are ready to greet you at 
every crossing. It is this class, that have come to 
America in such numbers, that have given grossly 
false impressions of the Irish character and people. 
The representatives, true representatives of Ireland, 
who have not been degraded by superstition and 
debauched by rum, are a most generous, large-hearted, 
clear- minded people. Their wit is proverbial, and 
their impulses are noble. 

Even among the poor classes this holds true. I was 
resting quietly on the steps of the Queen's Hotel the 



A SPECIMEN OF BLARNEY. 293 

evening before our departure, when a fine-looking 
fellow drove up with his jaunting ear, and in the most 
polite manner possible invited me to ride with him. 
I answered, laughingly, that I had spent a great deal 
of money already and must begin to economize. 

" Well, sir," said he, "lama poor man, but I would 
never think of charging so fine a looking gintleman! 
You can ride with me an hour and I will not charge 
you a penny." 

" But I do not see how you can afford this, and I 
would not be willing to take your time and tire out 
your horse when you might have someone able and 
willing to pay you." 

" Ah! Colonel," said he, " I am selfish, like the rest 
of the world. I know it will pay me. It will set off 
my car so to have you in it, that everyone will want 
to ride in the same car that the handsome American 
gintleman used ! I tell you, Colonel, I could make a 
fortune if I had a man like you to ride with me a little 
while every day ! " 

Here was an opportunity to help the poor fellow, 
but two considerations kept me back. Why did he 
take me for a Colonel ? He ought to have thought me 
a General ! I told him that there are said to be many 
temptations in tlie way of the rich, and that it might 
be better for him and me to remain poor. Of course 
this fellow knew that after one had ridden with him 



294 WANDERINGS IN EUROPE. 

he would be sure of his pay. But he has made many 
a shilling by his flatteries. 

It was a great pleasure, next morning, to see our 
ship steaming into the harbor. As soon as she was 
sighted, a flag was run up to the mast of the tender, and 
we took our black-thorns, ivy, and shamrock, and got 
aboard. As we neared the ship we recognized some 
friends whom we had met on the continent. There 
were also many distinguished Americans aboard— 
editors, ministers, authors, historians, tragedians, 
teachers, singers, and artists. But all were resting. 
The preachers had no opportunity to exercise their 
gifts, owing to the rigid rules of the company, or 
officers, who permitted nothing but the reading of the 
services of the Church of England ; the singers would 
not spoil their voices by using them in' the salon ; 
the pianists would not play on an instrument so badly 
out of tune ; the actors would not risk their reputations, 
and so a dull concert was the only entertainment 
afforded. 

It was cold, damp, and dreary, most of the way. 
The fog-horn kept blowing for hours and the passen- 
gers cheered each other up by talking about the 
cholera, and the prospects of many days of quarantine, 
and the delights of fumigation. The ladies were more 
highly favored than the gentlemen, for in rough 
weather they had a little parlor to which they could 



A LOST BIRD. 295 

go ; but the gentlemen were shut up in their state-rooms 
or in a dingy little saloon where smoking and gam- 
bling were in order by day and by night. 

When the storm abated, the voyage became tolera- 
ble, and the tables appeared more cheerful. Men 
exercised their skill playing at shuffle-board, and many 
pale-faced passengers appeared on deck. Their feat- 
ures plainly revealed the struggles of the past few days. 

Two days before reaching New York a land bird 
came on deck. It had been driven out by the storm, 
and was nearly exhausted when it found a refuge on 
the ship. There was much sympathy expressed for 
this lost wanderer, and one of the sailors played Noah 
and took it in where food and water were given it. 
Its necessity made it tame and willing to trust its fate 
to the hands of men. Its confidence was not misplaced, 
nor would it have been safe for anyone to have treated 
the tired bird with cruelty. There is a tender spot in 
every human heart, if we only had the skill to touch it; 
but the strange spectacle may be presented of men 
and women showing kindness to a bird and neglecting 
a brother or sister. How many of these have been 
driven out by storms against which they were not able 
to stand, and no refuge was near them, and no kind 
hand was reached out to take them in. A land bird 
many hundreds of miles out on the waters, compelled 
to liy by day and night, its wings weary, its feathers 



296 WANDERINGS IN EUROPE. 

wet, hungry and thirsty, and sleepy, calls forth our 
sympathies. No rough questions are asked of it about 
its coming here. No one says, " Why did you not stay 
on shore?" We are not always so considerate with 
our fellow mortals and the rude question reveals the 
spirit in which it is asked. Poor prodigal, what made 
you leave your home? Why do you not go back 
again ? Ah ! there was a storm, and for a little while 
it seemed so pleasant to be borne along with it, and at 
last return became impossible ! 

The sight of land came while we slept. We were 
near the shore, but were all unconscious of the fact. 
During the darkness the engines that had been pulsat- 
ing for eight days ceased to throb. 

We were lying at anchor in the upper quarantine. 
The morning dawned and eager watchers looked out 
toward the islands. A few minutes more and we 
would have been at the dock, but we were in quarantine. 
A boat belonging to the health department came near. 
We held a hurried consultation. The tenor of it was 
about this : We have come from a healthy port ; we 
have no sickness on board ; we have a clean bill of 
health, and now an officer comes from New York, 
where there is cholera ; will it not be wise for us to 
lower a life-boat and meet him and see that he is duly 
fumigated before we permit him to come on the 
vessel ? 



QUARANTINED. 297 

In half an hour he left us again and came back 
three hours later. It was very unsatisfactory to be 
kept in ignorance. Another boat came near and gave 
us our mail and daily papers. 

We were left to read and discuss the news and the 
prospect of getting ofi. We began to sympathize 
with the Roumania passengers, who had been treated 
like wild beasts or lepers. The health officers took 
our statements about where we had been during the 
last ten days, and then left us, saying that a few pieces 
of baggage that had been in Paris must be fumigated. 
They returned late in the afternoon, and sprinkled a 
disinfectant on the outside of a couple of trunks and 
left us again. 

One incident alone relieved the monotony of the 
day. A lady passenger from New York had a little 
pre-arranged signal with her husband, who had 
returned home before her. The lady stood on deck 
with her two little children, eagerly looking out to 
the island above Fort La Fayette. She would look 
through the field-glasses, and then return to her chair, 
only to rise and look again. At last she was rewarded 
for her patience. A gentleman appeared on the far- 
off island slope and waved two handkerchiefs. He 
held one in each hand and waved them. Then he 
looked at us through a glass. The passengers stood 
back, so as to leave the lady alone. She took a 



298 WANDERINGS IN EUROPE, 

handkerchief in each hand and waved them to her 
husband. Then she took the children and held them 
in her arms while the little fellows waved, and kissed 
their hands to papa. Thus the performance went on 
for half an hour, but the signals were understood. 
Wife and children had seen husband and father on the 
shore waiting for them. The husband and father had 
seen his wife and children on the anchored vessel. Love 
had invented a signal service of its own, and could now 
await the hour when fond hopes would be realized. 

It was dark when we were released and stepped out 
on solid land again, but this time the land was our 
own dear native land. Westward to the city by the 
lake we bore our treasures, and with satisfaction gave 
up the care of our ivy, and shamrock, and black-thorns. 

"How did you feel when you saw your native land 
again ? " May I turn to the first pages of these wan- 
derings for an answer? One can not well answer. 
Ask the preacher how he felt when, after delivering 
his first sermon, the people invited him to become 
their pastor. Ask the physician how he felt 
when his first patient was recovered, and paid 
him his bill. Ask the lawyer how he felt when, 
after making his first speech to a jury, he heard them 
give in a verdict for his client. Ask your brother- 
in-law how he felt when your sister did not reject 
his proposal ! Those old travelers who go to Europe 



BLISS OF INEXPERIENCE. 299 

every year without seeing anything have lost the 
delightful sensations that come to us when we are for 
the first time "home again, from a foreign shore." 
This is one of the joys we had not estimated when 
we left home. It can not be forecast. I had not 
dared think of it. It came with all the suddenness 
of the light that astonishes the child when the dark 
canvas is illuminated with the magnificent picture of 
the stereopticon. It had in it the calm, sweet, peace- 
ful assurance of the bow on the cloud when the storm 
has passed away. Oh ! the bliss of a new experience, 
that is a double delight because of our inexperience ! 
Our wanderings through Europe have passed into 
history. But let no one say that the memory of these 
pleasures is all that is left us now. There are chords 
in the human soul, that, when once touched, will 
never cease to vibrate. Warm greetings from loved 
ones, who, like myself, had considered the months 
of separation very long, convince me that " the best 
part of going away, is the coming back again ! " 

The summer months were gone and the fruits of 
autumn gathered in when the wanderer came home, 
and, with a grateful heart, stood once more before his 
people and looked again into their faces full of tender 
sympathy, and saw within the sacred place — not the 
less sacred because of its presence — the Banner of the 
American Eepublic. 



Lugile Vernon 



OR 



The Church at Lansington 

....BY 

THE REV. W. T. MELOY, D. D. 

PASTOR OF THE FIRST UNITED PRESBYTERIAN CHURCH, CHICAGO, ILL. 



12 Mo.] 208 Pages. Portrait and Illustrations. Handsomely 
bound in Cloth. Third Edition. 



f^fric^e: ©o c:e:]sxt: 



NOTICES OF THE PRESS. 

The author shows his power of touching hearts in this 
description of the scene after the wedding: u Mr. Vernon sat 
down in his house, and bowing his white head, allowed un- 
bidden tears to flow. Then he rose and walked through 
the different apartments of his dwelling, and said aloud : 
' This is, after all, only a house. Once it was a bright and 
happy home, but now it is only a large, elegant, dreary house. 
One by one the lights have gone out. I long for what is 
seldom found this side the grave— rest.' " 

Jane Grey Swisshelm, in the Chicago (111.) Advance. 

We congratulate the author on this literary lily of the 
valley. — The Interior. 

"It is splendid" said Mrs. Ekm, as she finished reading 
LUCTL.E Vernon last evening. " Money paid for such books 
is a good investment." I fully concur with my wife's views. 
I trust Luctle may find a place in every family. Let it 
have a wide circulation. I commend it with the greatest 
pleasure and satisfaction. 

JAS. A. EKIN, Late Dep'y Q. M. Gen'l U. S. Army. 



Address, inclosing* Thirty (2 cent) Stamps, 

W. T. MELOY 

149 SOUTH PAULINA STREET, CHICAGO. 







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